brett boone?

Jim Bowden's jones for former Reds players strikes again. He's giving Brett Boone a chance at making the Nationals. Boone has been out of the major leagues since 2005; he's 39 years old. It doesn't look like a good prospect - couldn't this attention be paid to some minor leaguer?

No, he's not like Dmitri Young. Young was only out of baseball for a year, and he was out of baseball because of personal problems more than a decline in skills. And at the start of the 2007 season, he was 33 not 39 - approaching the tme when a player declines, but better than the age when most players are long gone. So Young's very fine 2007 season (which I was wrong about, though I still wouldn't have given him the 2 year extension) does not constitute a reason for optimism about Boone. Neither do Bowden's reclamation projects with Ron Gant or Eric Davies.