And now onto the big fellas.

3. Like Halsey, Vasquez lasted a year with Arizona before he was traded. He was sent to the then-World Series champions Chicago White Sox and received pitcher Orlando Hernandez, pitcher Luis Vizcaino and outfielder Chris Young. The Snakes still have Vizcaino and Young, but Hernandez? Uh, nope.

If you're keeping score, we're up to 3 1/3 players and some kind of Cuban Duke.

3a. Hernandez was sent midseason to the New York Mets for reliever Jorge Julio, who is still with Arizona after they tendered him a contract last month. Flowchart complete.

So in exchange for Randy Johnson, over two years Arizona received:

Juan Cruz
Chris Young
Luis Vizcaino
Evan MacLane's torso

And to boomerang Randy Johnson back to the desert, they're giving away... oh this is spooky. Luis Vizcaino is one of the players. I paid attention in eighth grade algebra, and in an equation two equal variables cancel each other out. The other three players are: Ross Ohlendorf, Steven Jackson, and Alberto Gonzalez. Why an NFL running back and U.S. attorney general are in the Diamondbacks farm system I have no clue, but hey, what the heck.

Once this trade is finalized, Arizona will have effectively traded Ohlendorf, Jackson, and Gonzalez in exchange for Cruz, Young, and a wee bit of MacLane. Okay, nothing against the dude, but let's just forget about MacLane for a second. Of these six, Chris Young is by far the best prospect. Cruz is probably second, although at 28, he's not exactly a prospect anymore. The three young'uns going to the Yankees all played most of 2006 in Double-A, and all three had okay numbers.

I like the Young-Cruz-MacLane trio better than the Ohlendorf-Jackson-Gonzalez combo, not only because it's fewer letters to type, but also because I've actually heard of two of them. Of course, one of the latter three could certainly blossom in Scranton Wilkes-Barre before making a huge contribution in the big leagues. So we'll see.

Basically I just conjured up 700 words to finish with a "We'll see" conclusion. Hey, this is the kind of research baseball fans without lives conduct in January.