Nightmare Man movies The Tigers traded left handed outfielder Matt Joyce for Rays hurler Edwin Jackson.  Joyce, despite a solid rookie season in 2008, would have been hard pressed to find a spot on the team after it was announced that Carlos Guillen would be moving to left for the 2009 season.  That would have put Joyce no better then fifth on the outfield depth chart so he would have either spent a lot of time on the bench, or a lot of time in Toledo.

Edwin Jackson was a top prospect for the Dodgers at one point but after a solid September callup in 2003, he never quite got it done and was eventually dealt to the Rays.  Even there he never quite put it together until this past season when he finished 14-11 with a 4.42 ERA.

This worries me a little bit if the Tigers are relying on Jackson to just step right into to one of the open rotation spots.  Some of his past seasons, namely 2007, have been pretty poor and he’s never logged more then 184 major league innings in a season.  The good news is, Jackson is still young so if 2008 was a step on his way to pitching maturity, this could be a good value play.  As always, we’ll have to wait and see.

The Tigers also lost out on J.J. Putz.  It looks like the price tage was too high and he now finds himself with the Mets in what could be one of the best one-two punches in baseball with Putz and Francisco Rodriguez.

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