Mike Rizzo, Impartial Judge

Via Nats Journal:

Rizzo, on the importance of signing Adam Dunn to a long-term deal: "It's important for me because he's one of my favorite players on the team. I love the guy. There aren't many 40-home run, 100-RBI guys running around out there. He fits in with this club. He's a very unique leader, I call him. He leads in kind of a quirky way, but leads nonetheless. He's always open to helping the younger players. And you know, look at it this way: Several years down the road, if he continues at the pace he's at, we're gonna be talking about Hall of Famer Adam Dunn."

 Jesus Christ.

I'm as big an Adam Dunn fanboy as there is.  Check the archives; I think I was calling for the Nats to TRADE FOR DUN!!!1! sometime in October '99.  But the time to extend Dunn was before last season, when they could've locked him up at a discounted rate for a few more years.

I'm not sure it makes much sense to commit to Dunn for too much longer given his age and his defensive ability (where the best-case scenario is that he'll be below average at 1B instead of 'nuclear holocaust').  Finding a decent 1B is not a terribly difficult thing to do.  Dunn, thanks to his defense, ("defense," rather) isn't $10MM more per year better than someone like Russ Branyan, who signed for peanuts with Manny Acta in Cleveland.  That's to say that the team would likely be better off (think in terms of net runs scored/allowed) with a $2MM stopgap 1B and a $10 MM pitcher than the other way around, especially given the team's needs and scarcity of quality pitching.

But I do love the idea of Adam Dunn: Hall of Famer.  Used to be that the traditionalists hated him for the strikeouts and the statheads pointed out his offense.  Lately, the statheads have been ripping his defense, pointing out that it negates most of his offense value.  With no traditional defenders, and no stathead defenders, who's exactly going to be carrying the "Dunn for HOF" banner?  Well, besides the Rizzo parade...