Minor League Shuffle

The Nationals made a view moves in their minor league system over the past week or so. New Orleans

• Marlon Byrd OF was optioned from Washington to the Zephyrs when Matt Cepicky was recalled
• Edgar Gonzalez IF was promoted from the Senators to the Zephyrs
• John Halama LHP was signed as a free agent and assigned to New Orleans

Harrisburg

• Micah Bowie LHP reurned from a rehab assignment with the GCL Nationals
• Kenny Kelly OF was demoted to the Senators from the Zephyrs
• Henry Mateo IF was activated from the DL and assigned to Harrisburg

Potomac

• Brett Campbell CL was transferred from Savannah to Potomac. Campbell, a 34th round draft choice of the Montreal Expos, entered 2005 as a long reliever in the Gnats pen. Campbell's final 2005 Sand Gnats stats: 4-2, 1.69 and 19 saves.

There was one additional move made that is not reflected above. The Nationals activated Rule 5 3B Tony Blanco from the 15-day DL and in the process lost long relief RHP Sunny Kim to the Colorado Rockies on waivers.

While not an earth-shattering move, it reinforces the point that Jim Bowden is an ineffective GM. In spring training, the Nationals had a depth in back of the rotation starting pitchers. Mind you, these were not guys who you built a team around but are the pieces that teams in contention rely upon to fill in for their SPs in the case of injury or suspensions.

Jim Bowden, not to mention Frank Robinson have completely drained that pool. Gone are Tomo Ohka (trade to Milwaukee in the Junior Spivey deal), Claudio Vargas (allowed to be claimed off waivers by Arizona with no compenstion), Zach Day (trade to Colorado in the Preston Wilson deal), and now Sunny Kim. Whether it be personality conflicts (Day and Ohka) or simply letting players go for nothing (Vargas and Kim), Jim Bowden has proven himself inept. Why would a team that claims to be going for it this year allow themselves to so badly burned around the edges? As of today, the Nationals would call on Matt White, John Halama, or Ed Yarnall if they needed a #6 SP/long relief pitcher. That's not anything special. In fact, none of those guys are as good as the pitchers they let go.

The sooner the Nationals have an actual owner who can hire an actual GM who won't allow personality conflicts or bad judgement to cloud their vision, the better.