Interesting, baseless rumor from the New York Post

I know. I know. The New York Post. Bastion of fine, upstanding journalism. However, in light of Michael Young's hissy-fit about being asked to move to third base to accommodate Elvis Andrus, Young has since asked to be traded. Amazing to think that, at one time, the Rangers had Blalock, Teixeira, Young and A-Rod on the field at one time, and still finished in last place (2003). Anyhow, so now Young wants to be traded.

Joel Sherman of the New York Post (which is a good newspaper, despite my cheap shot above) posted a blog about possible destinations for Young. One of the four possibilities he lists is Houston, with Chicago (for Soriano), Colorado (for Todd Helton), and San Francisco (for Barry Zito or Aaron Rowand). Sherman lists Carlos Lee as a possible trade partner.

Within his post, Sherman rules out the Giants. I doubt the Cubs would be willing to move Soriano, because with Bradley they now have one of the most dominant outfields in baseball. Colorado makes sense, but I wouldn't imagine too many teams would be interested to see if Helton's batting average is really inflated by the thin air for that much money.

Which leads us to the Astros. Tejada would move to third (because it would just be funny if Easy Eddie traded for Young and then moved him to third, anyway. Bad business, but funny.) and the Astros would have a durable (Young has played in 155+ games since 2001) 32-year old .300 hitting shortstop.

The money owed Carlos Lee is more than the money still owed Young, so there's payroll relief there, too. So the question comes down to (1) Would Carlos Lee approve a trade back to Texas? and (2) What is to be gained by trading Lee's power for Young's average?

One of the reasons Carlos Lee chose Houston was the proximity to his cows, and no, that's not a metaphor. Oh, and the $100 million helped, too. Arlington isn't too much farther away and he still gets his money. Young is owed, on average, $6.5 million a year less than Lee.

Would you trade Lee's power? He has hit 20+ homers since his shortened rookie season in 1999 and was on pace for his sixth straight 30+ HR season when his little piggy went wee wee wee wee all the way home after getting plunked. Thoughts?