Asked by Los Angeles Times' writer Steve Dilbeck in an article entitled, "Dodgers say they are still buyers; did they claim Adam Dunn?" if the Dodgers were the team that had claimed the Washington Nationals' big middle-of-the-order-bat Adam Dunn on waivers, as had been rumored, LA GM Ned Colletti said simply, "'I can't tell you that.'" If the Dodgers were considering actually attempting to complete a trade with Washington, the price probably went up (just a saying, it probably didn't) after Dunn went off on the Dodgers' left-hander Clayton Kershaw last night, blasting two three-run HR's in a 6-3 Nats' win over LA in Dodger Stadium.
Mr. Dilbeck references the recent articles out of San Francisco as the source off all the chatter surrounding Dunn, noting that the, "San Francisco Chronicle’s Henry Schulman thinks it was the Dodgers. Schulman admits it’s his speculation, but said it was based on things he’d heard around the league." In Mr. Dilbek's opinion, There’s no way the Nationals are going to allow Dunn to be claimed and get nothing back...":
"They’ll take him back off the waiver wire, and then have 48 hours to negotiate a possible deal with the Dodgers...The deal would make more sense if a third team was involved and willing to take Ramirez."
I hope Kenny Williams doesn't read this and get any ideas...
• Next: Rob Dibble on the Nats/Dunn...
• Asked by his cohost what he knew about the Washington Nationals' intentions towards their big middle-of-the-order bat Adam Dunn, MASN and Sirius/XM analyst Rob Dibble offered the following on his MLB Network Radio show "First Pitch" on Friday afternoon:
Rob Dibble: "I think there's a few things that need to happen, and if he does stay with them for the next two months, they could offer him arbitration, they could sign the extension, I don't think they want to go four years, I don't think a lot of teams depending on any of their players want to go four or five years any more. But I think in Adam's case, he loves Washington, he loves the guys in the clubhouse and he doesn't want to go to that DH role just yet. So, it's a combination of a lot of things, you got Bryce Harper sitting out there, it's going to cost a good chunk of change to sign him. You want to probably sign some free agents, and they're getting very close to being a competitive team as far as the way the pitching has already come on, Stephen Strasburg will be a little bit older, Jordan Zimmermann will be healthy. You've got Jason Marquis, who's got another year on his contract. So you've got people already in place to make this a better ballclub, and if you think Dunn's going to be here and part of the future for the next two, three, four years, they're going to go ahead and probably sign him to the extension. If you don't think that and you think that and you think that maybe getting some young pitchers, some quality guys in return for him then you do the deal. But either way, if he stays it's a win/win situation for the Nationals, if he goes it's probably going to be a win/win because you're going to bring some very good players to the organization...But I would hate to see him personally go, cause I think he's a wonderful guy, one of my favorite people I've ever been around. He's always up, always pushing everybody else around him to make them better and I think that's the kind of guy you need on any team..."
In other words, #signDunn.