Goodness gracious, where to begin? Let's start at What the bloody hell is Ned Colletti thinking? First we'll take a look at the lesser of two evils: The Maddux deal. The Dodgers trade Cesar Izturis to the Cubs and get Greg Maddux in return, a 327 game winner, a 4 time Cy Young award winner, a surefire first ballot hall of famer, a 40-year-old geezer. Maddux was great, but the keyword is was. He is like the Toronto Raptors Hakeem or the Boston Celtics Bill Walton. At this point in his career his skills have waned and he is nothing more than a mediocre back of the rotation starter. And what did we give up for him? A 26 year old Gold-Glove winning shortstop and a Dodger fan favorite. And for what? An old pitcher who might not even be back next year. Will we look back on this trade in the offseason and think we got the better end of the deal if Maddux turns out to only be a 2 month rental? The answer is: Only if we win the World Series. And I have a better chance of nailing Paris Hilton before that happens (But don't we all?).

Now to the other deal. The Dodgers give prized prospect Joel Guzman to the Devil Rays in exchange for Julio Lugo. In his roughly 8 months as general manager of the Dodgers, Ned Colletti has made three trades with the Devil Rays. Three. We took Danys Baez, Lance Carter, Mark Hendrickson, Toby Hall, and Lugo from the D-Rays. Correct me if I'm wrong, but whenever you're consistently bringing in Devil Rays to help your ballclub, it's not a good sign. Baez and Carter aren't even playing for the Dodgers anymore, which goes to show how shitty these guys really are. It's as if Colletti has a fixation with shittiness. Why is this the worst of the two deals? Because as awful as the Maddux deal was, you could maybe understand a little since we do desperately need starting pitching and the infield was overcrowded, so trading Izturis uncrowds the infield. But turning around and getting Lugo right away crowds it right back up. So now he'll play second base for a week or so until Jeff Kent gets back. Then what? He'll have no place to play. And it's virtually guaranteed he wont be back next season after hearing his agent say after the season "he's going to go back to playing shortstop." Which means he wont be with the Dodgers with Rafael Furcal's $39 million already at that position (another Colletti blunder).

So we give up Joel Guzman to get Lugo for two months. Granted, if we were going to trade away any of the young guys, I would have picked Guzman to go. A couple months ago when this guy was called up, he struggled. When he got sent back down, he was asked by a reporter how he would respond to being sent down and said "I have nothing to say." He was clearly jealous of the success his fellow rookies like Andre ether and Russell Martin are having, and instead of trying to make the most of his opportunity, he just pouted in the dugout over a lack of playing time. Now, of course, he'll go on to become a star in Tampa Bay, and then the Yankees will then pluck him for big bucks, so the whole country can hate him as Dodger fans do now.

With the deadline now over with, the Dodgers can now put their heads down and charge towards San Diego's 5 game lead, which, in my opinion, they won't catch. They're still no less done than they were a week ago. If I had to give Ned Colletti a grade for the trade deadline deals, he would get an F. And F stands for "You Fucked Up, Sir."