Stroker or Not

With the stroker you can easily stay with the 3.23 gears. Same with the converter, you wouldn't need a lot of stall, especially if it has a small cam. I probably wouldn't go less than 2500 tho. I would have the trans rebuilt with some good clutches and a good shift kit. All the extra torque can hurt a trans if it doesn't have good firm/quick shifts. As for the budget of 4k, I don't think you could buy a stroker for amount. I could be wrong tho. I haven't really priced them lately.