There's no doubt we're short-term sellers, but Ubaldo is a great longer term buying opportunity. If baseball reference's contract numbers are correct, Ubaldo's contract going forward is 4.2M, 5.75M, and 8M for 2012 - 2014, respectively.

Ubaldo appears to me to be a very rare opportunity to pick up an ace under contract for multiple seasons. Usually the deals involving aces are what essentially is a "trade and sign" where the team acquiring the ace is hoping the ace will sign a long-term deal with those deals usually being very expensive. Ubaldo isn't a rental, the real question is, is he a mirage? The Rockies are asking a lot for the opportunity to find out the hard way. Supposedly they want the farm in a "Herschel Walker"-type deal. Supposedly they want Montero, Banuelos, and Nova from the Yankees. Seemingly it would cost the Royals something like Duffy, Odorizzi, and Eibner. Maybe I'm off on the prospects required, I'm sure many will correct me if so.

I think this is the type of risk we need to take. We need to start turning prospects into players and a trade like this is how it happens. Dealing for Ubaldo doesn't blow up this team contending, it pushes us closer toward it. His contract locks him in until 2014 and does so at a very favorable price. Signing a comparable pitcher on the open market this (or next) offseason would cost probably close to 3x more and could be a significant albatross payroll-wise going forward. As the many "what does having the best farm system mean?" posts have explained, it basically means we have the pieces. What separates the great teams from the failures is how they use those pieces. Deals need to be made. Why not make this one?