Korean SS Jung-Ho Kang to Post Next Week

By Daryll Dorman |

Ken Rosenthal reports that Korean SS Jung-Ho Kang will be posted next week. This is no surprise – the question is where will he go and how much is he worth?

The Cardinals and Yankees were early reports to be interested, but should the Padres take a chance? Certainly with Everth Cabrera no longer a part of the Padres future the shortstop position needs to be filled. The Yankees should be out after trading for Didi Gregorius the other day, and the Cardinals do have Jhonny Peralta already. Furthermore, the Padres have struck out so far on free agency bids – but made the big bids that would be required to make a splash.

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The real question is whether Kang is worth it or not. He batted .380 with 38 homers in the KBO last season, and is 27 years old, with his birthday coming right around opening day 2015. While certainly more and more the international market players seem more MLB ready than it used to be, what if it takes Kang two years of seasoning in the minors to be ready for The Show? By then he will a 30 year old unproven rookie, and how much longer until 2015 first round draft pick Trea Turner is ready?

Yes, I do want the Padres to try and get a real shortstop and not just wait for the Chosen One Turner to come along. It may not happen. Anyone remember Matt Antonelli?

No, I do not want the Padres to feel like they have to make a bid on any name that is put “on the board”, which as fun as it is to speculate, for a team with limited resources it doesn’t take too many bad signings to cripple a team.

Keep in mind too, teams are only bidding first to have the rights to negotiate with Kang. THEN they have to come to terms with the player. They will have until the end of the week to see who can negotiate, and then have some time to work out a deal.

Worth giving it a shot? Sure, why not. But let’s not break the bank doing it.

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