Central Teams Making Some Moves

News today on two rather significant NL Central transactions.

First, the Cubs signed a Japanese player who plays the outfield and hits lefthanded. That's all we're really sure about at this point - as we've seen in the past, you never know if one of these Japanese players is going to be successful (Ichiro, Hideki Matsui) or completely overhyped (Fat Toad Irabu, Kaz Matsui) or even successful and completely overhyped (Dice-K). I think that since he's going to the Cubs, we can at least be sure that he'll be completely overhyped.

Also, reports out of Baltimore say that the Orioles have traded Miguel Tejada to the Astros for 5 players. Off of their major league team, Houston gives up Luke Scott, Matt Albers and Dennis Sarfate. There were two guys I'd never heard of in the deal, and I'm not going to bother to look up - I assume they're prospects. Scott seems like a decent enough player, but I don't see how this doesn't improve the Astros for next year unless Tejada has completely lost it. I admit that since he's on the Orioles, I haven't seen him play in several years. Houston still doesn't have any pitching after Oswalt, and their defense, with Lee, Tejada, Berkman, etc. might rival the Brewers as worst in the division, so I'm not sure they're a threat yet in the Central.