The Rays Tank: The Amazing Race to Find a Place for Price

Shake off that case of the Mondays, we’re another day closer to February, which means another day closer to pitchers and catchers reporting!

The top news yesterday on Raysbaseball.com was a preview of the most recent episode of The Amazing Race, featuring an interview with Kim DeJesus and Nicky Getz. Kim was also live-tweeting the episode last night, so if you also watch, you can gain some "insider knowledge."

Ben Horrow of Beyond the Box Score proposes a three-way trade which would send David Price to the Reds and Brandon Phillips to the Yankees. I definitely would not be okay with this deal, but here's some further analysis from Danny on what's being offered:

While the trade is well thought out, Harrow believes the Rays would be satisfied with only two prospects for David Price -- Yankees OF prospect Mason Williams and Reds SP Tony Cingrani -- and I'm having a difficult time taking this seriously.

Cingrani, 24, is a left handed starter who can touch 95, but saw that velocity decline in his rookie season as he suffered from back spasms along the way. He threw 104.2 innings for the Reds (18 of 23 appearances as the starter), striking out 28.6% of batters faced and walking 10.2%, en route to a 2.92 ERA and 3.58 FIP. He was the Reds' third best prospect entering the season, and was ranked No. 82 overall by Baseball America.

Williams, 22, entered the season as the Yankees' best prospect. His biggest criticism has been his slow development in the minors since being drafted in 2010. He climbed into Double-A for the first time this season, but only for seventeen games. Fangraphs said Williams "Looked ready to explode" heading into this season, but expectations are beginning to be tempered. His third season in Class-A ball featured a disappointing .317 wOBA. aseball America had ranked Williams as high as No. 32 after 2012, but he was not included in their mid-season Top 50 this summer.

And that's it.

The Rays have been able to draw multiple top prospects from organizations on a regular basis, most notably including the James Shields/Wade Davis trade last winter -- which netted a consensus Top-5 prospect in Wil Myers, a Baseball America Top-100 in Jake Odorizzi, former Top-50 Mike Montgomery, and a decent filler.

What Horrow is proposing would be not too far removed from recommending the Shields trade all over again, but this time without Wil Myers. Horrow's logic is that, "acquiring a top outfield prospect, an MLB ready left-handed starting pitcher, and some salary to spend after not resigning Price, isn't bad." Sure, but it isn't good either, especially if you think David Price is a better pitcher than Shields was when he was traded with two years remaining on his contract. And I haven't even mentioned the evils of helping the Yankees get better in any way, shape or form...

Horrow finished his article with the standard disclaimer that all teams might think the proposed trade is a bad idea, and I'd have to agree. If the Rays cannot bag more with David Price than they did with James Shields, they should walk away.

Meanwhile, we've been conducting our own trade speculation for David Price. Danny started a series last week in which he interviews other SB Nation editors on their team's level of interest in acquiring David Price. Each discussion ends with a trade proposal that tries to include two Top-50 prospects, or at least the best young player on the other team.

Part 1 featured interviews with our Mariners, Cubs, and Rangers affiliates, and Part 2 will continue today with the Twins, Braves, and Diamondbacks.

Links:

- Of course, another week can’t go by without another suggestion for relocation of the Rays, and Nick Cafardo is still preaching that the Rays could move to Montreal.

- Ken Woolums looks into the trade value of Max Scherzer, which shouldn't be too far removed from David Price.

- Will Leitch of Sports on Earth takes a look at how closers have been unlikely heroes in the postseason.

- David Temple of FanGraphs examines double plays in the playoffs.

- The Cardinals have officially named Adam Wainwright as their game 1 starter for the World Series. Here’s mlb.com's preview of the World Series matchup between the Cardinals and the Red Sox. As a reminder, Game 1 starts at 7:30 PM on Wednesday.