Royals Discussing Utley, Sox in on Young?

In lockstep with Tim Brown’s piece at Yahoo! that states the Phillies will enter a “partial rebuild”, word from the Boston Globe’s Nick Cafardo came out today that the Kansas City Royals have begun internally discussing acquiring Chase Utley. On Thursday, we looked at prospective matches for a hypothetical Utley trade, citing the Yankees, Orioles, and Blue Jays as teams that may be interested. No rumors as to who the Royals would offer but the Royals do have three Baseball America Top 100 prospects in their system: RHP Kyle Zimmer (24), OF Bubba Starling (35), and RHP Yordano Ventura (85). That’s probably be a good place to start the discussion.  Starling and Ventura have struggled this season while Zimmer has good K totals (10.4 / 9 IP) but has had some bad luck (5.40 ERA).

In addition to the Utley rumors, Rob Bradford of WEEI.com believes that third baseman Michael Young may be a good fit for the Red Sox. Bradford reported that no “single conversation” has happened yet between the Red Sox and Phillies, while a New York Post report states that the Red Sox “want (Young) badly”. Young was traded for Lisalverto Bonilla and Josh Lindblom in the off-season and a comparable return would be likely.