1. Lackey/Vlad. Completely agree. I’ll miss them both, but it’s time to say good-bye for the reasons you state.

2. Bobby Abreu. Yes, yes, and more yes! Tony Reagins needs to be like Don Logan (the Ben Kingsley character in “Sexy Beast”) and overcome all obstacles in order to sign him (hopefully with better results than Don). He really is the key to the off-season. If we get him signed, then we can let Figgy walk because we will have our leadoff hitter, and there are any number of hitters out there we can pick up to deepen our lineup. If we don’t get him signed, we are almost forced to bring back Figgy back because there really aren’t any viable FA alternatives out there who could hit leadoff for us. And I would rather invest the money in Abreu than Figgy at this point.

3. Aroldis Chapman. I don’t know much about him, and it seems that most people don’t know much about him. I don’t think it would be a good idea to spend over $40 million on an unknown like him. I think Eddie Bane had it right when he pointed out that though Chapman might be able to hit 100 mph with his fastball, so was Alan Embree when he was young. If we are going to gamble millions of dollars, I think I’d rather take a chance on someone like Rich Harden, who we know can at least get major league hitters out. And we could probably get Harden for two years / $20 million, or significantly less than what Chapman’s agent is demanding in signing bonus money alone. (Kendry Morales signed a 6 year, $4.5 million deal which could get as high as $10 million, which seems like a steal now.)

4. Figgy. Superfluous if we sign Abreu, but crucial if we don’t. If we sign Bobby to leadoff and a run producer like Matsui or Holliday, I wouldn’t have a problem if we let Figgy walk. It’s time to let Brandon Wood show what he can do (which, ultimately, I think will be something along the lines of Joe Crede – not a very good BA, fairly low OBP, solid power, great glove).

5. Darren Oliver. I like Oliver a lot, but I think I’d prefer to sign a reliever who can close like Takashi Saito or Billy Wagner and have Fuentes take over Oliver’s role.

6. GMJ. Good God yes, if the Reds do it. But doesn’t Drew Stubbs play CF for them now? And if i were the Reds I would hold onto Cordero and hope that he has a good first half of 2010, then trade him at the All Star break to a contender that thinks it needs a closer. They probably wouldn’t get that much for him, but they probably wouldn’t have to take on a boat anchor contract like GMJ’s, either.

7. Wood. I like this idea of making him a four corners player if we end up keeping Figgy around. I’m assuming he wouldn’t have that much of a difficult time learning how to play OF. But I think Angel management has designs of making him an everyday position player at one spot, and I don’t have a problem with that, either.

8. Mathis/Napoli. I think they are both cheap enough that we can afford to keep both of them. Also, I think it’s actually very important to keep Napoli around in case Bobby Abreu is the only FA hitter we are able to sign – then we would need a DH, and Napoli and his power could slot in very nicely (and cheaply) in that slot.