I could see that kind of lineup happening sometimes, possibly with Harrison as the 3B. In addition, getting Polanco more regular rest would not be a bad idea. A bench composed of Frazier, Freese, Rodriguez, and Brentz/Nava/Saunders/Luplow/Osuna has the potential to be pretty decent.
At the end of the day, Dickerson is relieving to me because he firms up the situation that already exists a bit more. Tons of what ifs/possibilities remain, but offensively it's more about Polanco/Moran and the right combinations. As for the rotation, if Kuhl and Williams repeat, that will firm up the floor for the team overall, and if anything, Hudson being out of the picture opens up more of a chance to wield the pen as a weapon. It's really just a nice win-win from the perspective of the corner this team has backed itself into.
Frankly, I'm not really sure there's a big difference between Cutch and Dickerson, production-wise, at this point, and the same basically goes for their defense (Cutch has somewhat of an edge, assuming he doesn't start tapering off, but the difference isn't very big). Unless Polanco or Marte totally collapse or something, then as a team, they have to be better than what we saw overall last year. The question is really what potential there is for some X-factor to catapult them into the WC race more legitimately. I've repeated Polanco and Moran ad nauseam for weeks, but here I think it's more Musgrove/Glasnow. If one emerges as an upper half of the rotation starter, then the team is a good bit more formidable.
I don't really think any of the top prospects can be counted on in this regard: Keller has only thrown like 40 AA innings, Tucker is still a bit away, Meadows needs to show he can be healthy and produce some in AAA, etc. Maybe Newman is an outside shot to rebound some and make some noise, but I think Musgrove/Glasnow are really the only possible fits.
Further, if I had to guess, I imagine that this is the kind of thing Huntington will say when he's asked: we've re-arranged, gotten a bunch of control, are confident in our young guys, and have a good amount of flexibility to make adjustments at the trade deadline. The latter line is definitely true, even though they basically will never do that.
I'm also not really sure I'd even want to venture back into the market, hypothetically speaking. Wouldn't touch Lance Lynn with a 10 foot pole, and Cobb is a little iffy for me to want to lose a pick for. The only names hovering out there I think I'd like to see are Cahill and Siegrist, on minor league deals.