Trade Analysis

The inimitable Jayson Stark evaluates the winners and losers of the Roy Halladay-Cliff Lee trade and includes a variety of scouting opinions on ALL the players involved.

The bottomline?

This was about extending their window of NL dominance as long as possible, not for one brief run at glory.

If they'd stood pat, Lee almost certainly would have headed off next winter to hit the free-agent lottery. And they'd most likely have gotten outbid by the Yankees or Red Sox on Halladay. So without either Lee or Halladay, the Phillies very conceivably might have had to blow up their team and retool.