What a week it’s been for baseball! The winter meetings in Dallas have seemed less like a conclave of handsomely paid business executives and more like an alcohol-soaked meeting of the North Winnetka Rotisserie League.

Little but Old Crow can explain a week in which teams actually traded for the services of Tony Womack and Dewon Brazleton. It was a week in which the Detroit Tigers signed 41-year-old Kenny Rogers to a two-year, $16 million contract and the Colorado Rockies, of all teams, signed flammable closer Jose Mesa to a deal; a week that saw us saddened by the retirement of Rickey Henderson, maybe the greatest ballplayer I’ve ever seen, but gladdened by the wonderful news that the Mets may be about to sign 47-year-old Julio Franco to a multiyear deal.

Topping all – even the hilarious free agent contracts given to the likes of Rogers and fake no. 2 starter A.J. Burnett – was the wonderful variety of nonsensical and bizarre trades made. Old-time wheeler-dealers like Bill Veeck would have enjoyed themselves thoroughly.

At the top of the list of insane moves was the deal that sent Brad Wilkerson, Termel Sledge, and a player to be named later from Washington to the Texas Rangers for Alfonso Soriano. While predictions are usually the best way for a sportswriter to turn himself into a fool, I would bet a sizeable sum that Soriano won’t hit 20 home runs this year. Soriano’s batting line away from hitter friendly Ameriquest Field last year was .224 BA/.265 OBA/.374 SLG. The year before, it was .244/.291/.444.Why? Because Texas’s park increases home runs by 20% compared to a neutral park; RFK stadium decreases them by 24%.

Soriano will be awarded at least $10 million in arbitration, and the Nationals don’t even intend to play him at second base – they’ll be playing him in the outfield! Wilkerson will be making a third as much money and is a better defender and hitter. This is one of the most senseless trades in memory.

In theory, the next most inscrutable move was Atlanta’s exchange of third baseman Andy Marte – commonly ranked at this time last year as the best prospect in all of baseball – for expensive Red Sox shortstop Edgar Renteria (who isn’t especially good) and a pile of cash. I’m not so sure it’s as senseless as it seems, mainly because the Braves have earned considerable credibility in their judgment over the last decade. If they don’t think Marte, who just turned 22, is going to develop into a great player, then I don’t either. And in the near term, Renteria is a decent replacement for the departed Rafael Furcal.

For the Red Sox, barring some further move, the trade makes little sense. This is a contending team full of veteran players – why get rid of the starting shortstop to bring on the top prospect at a position where the team already has Kevin Youkilis, who’s cheap, young, and good, and Mike Lowell, who’s expensive and primed for a big comeback season? The Sox now have no shortstop, no center fielder, and are still looking to trade Manny Ramirez, whose bat they probably won’t be able to replace in any feasible deal – and yet at the same time are at least in theory built to win this year.

On balance, this makes a whole lot more sense for the Braves than it does for the Sox, though if Marte fulfills his promise, all these questions will suddenly seem irrelevant, no matter how the Sox fare this year.

Next up are the Toronto Blue Jays, who appear to have simply gone mad. After committing over $100 million to a closer and a no. 3 starter, they traded David Bush, a 26-year-old league-average starter, and two intriguing young players for Lyle Overbay, a first baseman who hits like a mediocre third baseman. Interestingly, the Jays already have three players who fit that exact description – Shea Hillenbrand, Corey Koskie, and Eric Hinske – all of whom can at least play a passable third base.

Unless Toronto’s new strategy of overwhelming the league with hordes of players hitting .280/.335/.440 is backed by Cy Young-caliber performances from Burnett and B.J. Ryan and an unexpected Joe DiMaggio-quality campaign from center fielder Vernon Wells, all the sound and fury they’ve made will come to nothing in the stacked AL East.

Have any teams made trades that make any sense whatever? Yes, actually. The Cubs shipped three of the vaguely promising young pitchers they seem to grow on a farm in Iowa (they have gone through dozens of these guys in the last few years) for center fielder Juan Pierre, who’s no great prize but will get on base 36% of the time and would have turned the Cubs into a wild-card contender had he played for the club last year.

The Arizona Diamondbacks, meanwhile, shipped another couple of vaguely promising relievers to Atlanta for solid catcher Johnny Estrada, whom the Braves wanted gone on account of their hordes of promising young catching prospects. And the Chicago White Sox traded Damaso Marte, one among their many good relievers, for Pittsburgh’s Rob Mackowiak, who can legitimately play all three outfield spots and all the infield spots save shortstop without embarrassing himself and while hitting at the league average. This sort of player is a lot more valuable than people realize because they keep the team from ever putting in an outright scrub while giving all the regulars some rest.

None of these last three trades were so sexy as the first three mentioned here – but they were all mutually beneficial deals that saw two teams exchange equal value to fill real needs. There is no reason to believe anyone had a lampshade on his head while negotiating them. This is a good thing.

tmarchman@nysun.com