Posted by Brian Joseph on Monday, July 26, 2010 at 4:01 am

I remember thinking about how much of an overreaction it was when the mainstream media and Sabermetric community jumped on the “firing Josh Byrnes has destroyed the D-backs” bandwagon. Then I got this text:

ESPN MLB – Angels acquire 3-time All-Star P Dan Haren from Diamondbacks for (ham sandwich)

Okay, it didn’t read exactly like that but the haul — Joe Saunders, minor leaguers Rafael Rodriguez and Pat Corbin, and a player to be named later (possibly Tyler Skaggs) — is only more impressive than a ham sandwich if that sandwich is missing dijon mustard. And if that ham sandwich came with a pickle… forget about it!

Anyway, there’s little that’ll be written to defend Byrnes from this writer being one of the few to look at the team from the desert and see anything more than a team in line to finish at the bottom of the National League West. Plus, Byrnes’ historical moves, other than the deal to land Haren in the first place, weren’t great nor was his draft success. Consider Ed Wade wasn’t worthy of two more years in Houston despite at least breaking even on the deals he made in his first two years and his proven track record of rebuilding a broken minor league system in Philadelphia — they drafted Chase Utley, Ryan Howard, Brett Myers, Cole Hamels among others under his watch — and it’s hard to feel sorry for a less successful Byrnes.

Then again, the level of confidence that Byrnes could have found a better deal than the one that went down between Arizona and the Angels on Sunday is extremely high. Heck, even Octopus Paul had a better shot of picking a better deal out of his tank in Oberhausen, so that’s not saying much.

Unless the D-backs know something that we don’t (I say “we” because I’ve yet to find one person defending this deal) about Haren, this deal is a big win for the Angels.  Though, with prospects, the level of unpredictability makes any move tied to minor leaguers impossible to evaluate right away. (Like that’ll stop us!)

With the timing of the deal (7 days before the deadline), one has to think the D-backs thought this was a solid haul for Haren. As sellers of a younger (29), cheaper ($8.25 million in ‘10), and under control beyond ‘10 (owed $25.5 million in ‘11 and ‘12 and an option for $15.5 million in ‘13) pitcher, Haren was probably at the top of many of the buyer’s lists out there.

Even though I wasn’t bowled over by the haul of Justin Smoak for Cliff Lee by Seattle, I had to at least applaud the way they used the Yankees to drum up a sense of urgency to eventually score what they thought was a better deal from their division mates in Texas. The Haren deal, on the other hand, had lukewarm buzz before the Angels scored what might be the prize of the ‘10 trade deadline. Even after mention of the Yankees, the lack of a name like Jesus Montero tied to the deal failed to give the competition the teeth to scare anyone (apparently) into tossing a Top 100 prospect Arizona’s way.

In the end, maybe shopping a player of Haren’s caliber with so much time remaining on his contract made other teams believe that either he was damaged goods or Arizona was so desperate to trim payroll, the deal didn’t have to be overwhelming… which is exactly what  the return on Haren wasn’t.

So, maybe not everyone is sour on the D-backs’ deal outside of the Arizona front office. FOXSports’ Ken Rosenthal doesn’t seem to think it’s the slam dunk win that nearly everyone else does for the Angels and maybe he’s right. In the mean time, if this was the best of all the deals on the table and Haren returns to his ‘07-’09 ways, a lot of teams will be kicking themselves for not ponying up a little more.