The MLB trading deadline is next Friday and today's Nats team might not be the one that's on the field come Aug. 1. While the overall team is a hulking, rotting, bloated mess, there are some individual parts that could interest contending teams.
The most obvious target is Nick Johnson. Boston would've been a good target for him, but the Adam LaRoche trade ended that. San Francisco is reportedly interested in him. Given that their primary first baseman, Travis Ishikawa, neither slugs nor gets on base, The Walking Stick would be a huge upgrade for the surprise contender.
NJ's contract is up at the end of the season. He's on the borderline as far as whether he'd return draft-pick compensation. And even if he does, all the Nats would get is a sandwich pick, somewhere around number 35 overall.
If they trade him now, they can probably get two semi-decent prospects or one major-league ready player. Earlier rumors had him connected to Boston for reliever Manny Delcarmen.
The other large target is Josh Willingham. The Phillies are reportedly interested in the suddenly hot masher. A few places reported that the Nats had interest in starting pitcher Kyle Kendrick, but the Phillies haven't seen inclined to do that.
Willingham would be an attractive target for a lot of teams. A team trading for him would control his contract for two more seasons. After an ice-cold start, he's up to an impressive .294/ .414/ .564, which ranks him among the league's best hitters.
Because of that, there's no reason for the Nats to rush to make a deal. If NJ goes, either Willingham or Adam Dunn could slide over to first. The Nats need to do what's best for the long-term version of the franchise, but trading away anyone and everyone useful would hasten the team's slide to irrelavancy.
It should be an interesting week for the team's interim front office. Do they make long-term moves? Do they focus more on the short term and the next year or two? Are those goals mutually exclusive?
There are a bunch of tough choices for Mike Rizzo and the gang.
Chris Needham used to write Capitol Punishment. Now he tweets about the team when not trading Belliard for top prospects in his mind.
