Anthony Amobi: Does O's Guthrie belong on the block?

We are a time during each and every season where teams looking forward to playing in October are looking for help via trades. They need an extra piece to contend and often look at second division teams to acquire a player or two for the stretch run. Meanwhile, teams that know they are realistically out of contention for the season are looking to dump expensive or productive players with value in exchange for young talent or a player who is perhaps more cost-effective. For the Orioles, Jeremy Guthrie's name has once again been mentioned as player some teams would like to have in the trade market. Right now, Guthrie is 2-9 and leads the American League in losses. However, if you look at his peripheral numbers and discount the nine losses, the man has an astounding 3.79 ERA. Over the past few weeks, I've told friends that the Orioles should perhaps extend Guthrie's contract. He is the de facto ace of the staff, an innings eater and a guy who seems to very accountable for whatever happens on the mound - his fault or not. At times, it almost seems as if Guthrie is stuck in neutral. His situation in Baltimore may not be bad; alas, it has not improved much, either, in the past several seasons. However, perhaps now the Orioles should trade him and move on. Fans have argued this. My friends and I have gone back and forth about this over email and at our Sunday morning hangout. On a sports talk radio station while driving into work yesterday, the conversation centered on keeping Guthrie an Oriole versus trading him. They figured that the team would be well served to trade him to a contender - not only for help, but also for Guthrie's sake. The hosts believed that Guthrie needs to be traded to save his career. Well, the more I thought about it, the more I agreed with them. At this point, Guthrie is on the wrong side of 30 and may have a limited amount of time before his decline phase begins. I do not know if the Orioles are considering him a viable part of their future; nevertheless, I believe Guthrie would prosper if put into a contending situation. I would like to see what Guthrie could do if he ever pitched in a meaningful game down the stretch. The fan in me says to keep Guthrie; however, the blogger and armchair analyst thinks that the Orioles should send him on his way, allow him to evolve somewhere else and see if he could help another team in its playoff push. Anthony Amobi blogs about the Orioles at Oriole Post. His observations about the O's appear as part of MASNsports.com's season-long initiative of welcoming guest bloggers to our site. All opinions expressed are those of the guest bloggers, who are not employed by MASNsports.com but are just as passionate about their baseball as our roster of writers.