2014 Roster Discussion

[Guest]

I've always understood the need to "tear down" the roster to be a result of the weight of the value being in guys who were post-prime. The 2011 team was terrible and if it was to be truly good in 2012 it needed to rely on guys like Zambrano, Dempster, Ramirez, Soriano, and Byrd in addition to adding an unreasonable amount of high-end talent. Since the farm system was barren, the Cubs needed to not only get top end talent, but to get role players with a better short AND long-term prognosis to avoid chasing their tail for the same marginal wins as the above players left or continued to decline.

 

1) The farm system wasn't barren. It wasn't great, but it seems how bad it was is being revisionist-historied further into the depths every year.

 

2) The consensus at the time was that the Cubs were stacked with role players in the minor leagues who could be contributors quickly. It was the major strength of the system.

 

3) Finding cheap, useful players is supposed to be the sort of thing good front offices do. It was something Epstein was very good at in his early years in Boston. They did a bit better job this year, but in 2012 they were really, really terrible at it.

 

We have hindsight now, we can see that the farm system did not have anything to contribute to the MLB team in the short-term save Castillo. That combined with third party evaluations of the system show it to be in pretty poor shape, quibble with the terminology however you like. In any case, credit to the front office for accurately assessing the talent on hand and not relying on the Jacksons, Coleman, Campana, etc. They had more misses in 2012(Stewart, Volstad) than 2013(Hairston), but they also had bounce backs from guys you'd expect it from(DeJesus, Wood).

[Beer Kaese]

I'm sure Kyle can see we have a good farm system ranking currently. That's literally step one and by far the easiest step to take. Turning that into a strength at the major league level is much more difficult to do. We're in wait and see mode there and will be for another year or two.

 

Most prospects flame out so you need a lot of them.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

I'm sure Kyle can see we have a good farm system ranking currently. That's literally step one and by far the easiest step to take. Turning that into a strength at the major league level is much more difficult to do. We're in wait and see mode there and will be for another year or two.

 

Most prospects flame out so you need a lot of them.

 

We have a lot of them. We have more than just about any team in baseball.

[Beer Kaese]

I'm sure Kyle can see we have a good farm system ranking currently. That's literally step one and by far the easiest step to take. Turning that into a strength at the major league level is much more difficult to do. We're in wait and see mode there and will be for another year or two.

 

Most prospects flame out so you need a lot of them.

 

We have a lot of them. We have more than just about any team in baseball.

 

I do no accept this. You need to go back and answer the Tiger.

[Beer Kaese]

I'm sure Kyle can see we have a good farm system ranking currently. That's literally step one and by far the easiest step to take. Turning that into a strength at the major league level is much more difficult to do. We're in wait and see mode there and will be for another year or two.

 

Most prospects flame out so you need a lot of them.

 

We have a lot of them. We have more than just about any team in baseball.

 

I do no accept this. You need to go back and answer the Tiger.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

There's nothing to answer. He and I have different evaluations and that's that.

 

You don't accept that we have possibly the deepest prospect pool in baseball? Then what are you so happy about?

[davell]

I'm sure Kyle can see we have a good farm system ranking currently. That's literally step one and by far the easiest step to take. Turning that into a strength at the major league level is much more difficult to do. We're in wait and see mode there and will be for another year or two.

 

Most prospects flame out so you need a lot of them.

Please tell us more. It's not like we have a minor league forum here that we dissect damn near every flaw anyone that sniffs our top 50 has. Jumping in on year 3 of this argument, you're not breaking new ground here, just go back and read. I've been on your side of the argument since it began when Theo took over, but you're not bringing anything new to this at all, because everything has been talked about ad nauseum already.

[Sammy Sofa]

I've always understood the need to "tear down" the roster to be a result of the weight of the value being in guys who were post-prime. The 2011 team was terrible and if it was to be truly good in 2012 it needed to rely on guys like Zambrano, Dempster, Ramirez, Soriano, and Byrd in addition to adding an unreasonable amount of high-end talent. Since the farm system was barren, the Cubs needed to not only get top end talent, but to get role players with a better short AND long-term prognosis to avoid chasing their tail for the same marginal wins as the above players left or continued to decline.

 

I don't know if any of that is directed at my points, but I was never arguing for the idea that they should cling to older players from the previous FO just for the desperate long shot of trying to compete. As soon as Hendry was out I was expecting most of the players on the major league team from his time would be gone, either via trade or simply not held on to. I just don't agree with the idea that they HAD to be terrible because they were dismantling the older team as if it were were blocking or hindering them from starting to rebuild, or as if taking the steps to rebuild were hinged on trading those players; the Cubs simply did not have enough valuable assets for that to be the case (plus I don't think the FO went out there both years with the intention of being this bad). Someone saying that they expected the Cubs to be bad for 2-3 years because they had to get rid of the old team is seemingly saying that they were bad in 2012 in large part because they got rid of Dempster and Marshall and Byrd and Soto, when that simply isn't the case. Yeah, Marshall would have certainly helped, but that bullpen was catastrophically bad and he couldn't have somehow carried it himself. Byrd and Soto had horrendous years, and Dempster was fantastic and the team still stunk. Same thing this year: the team was bad with or without Garza, Marmol and Soriano. Too many key players simply underperformed in both seasons; (I don't think) it wasn't some kind of intentional tank job or something that was the result of shedding older players. Just expecting that the Cubs were going to get rid of a ton of players from Hendry's time vs. expecting that the Cubs "needed" to be terrible for years because they were getting rid of those players; there seems like a clear difference in those opinions to me.

[SouthSideRyan]

I told my sister in 2010 the best thing the Cubs could do was blow it up. I got what I wanted, how about you?

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nw6WPSUlKb0

[SouthSideRyan]

By their thinking right now, I wonder who all is in "the core"? My guess is Starlin, Rizzo, Shark, Castillo, and Wood at the major league level. With Javy, Almora, Soler, Bryant, CJ, and maybe Alcantara in the minors.

 

Meaning 1 out of 11 "core pieces" were acquired through trading the cancerous vets and 1 out of 11 acquired from being really bad at the major league level.

[Guest]

I wasn't directing it at anyone in particular, especially since so much of the last few pages is people talking around each other based on terminology stuff.

 

To clarify, I don't think the team needed to reach some level of Ground Zero where everything was purged before they could start adding useful players, or that there's some level of terrible that was necessary before things got better. Given the roster's construction though, I don't think being non-competitive was avoidable last year(without doing huge damage to 2013 and beyond), and being a contender this year likely wasn't possible without a crazy hit rate on new acquisitions. Starting next year it shouldn't be an issue(particularly since we'll start seeing some of the fruit of the farm system), but financial restrictions and further stagnation from young guys(we can't get combined 4.5 fWAR from Rizzo/Castro/Castillo again) might damage those chances.

[Sammy Sofa]

I wasn't directing it at anyone in particular, especially since so much of the last few pages is people talking around each other based on terminology stuff.

 

To clarify, I don't think the team needed to reach some level of Ground Zero where everything was purged before they could start adding useful players, or that there's some level of terrible that was necessary before things got better. Given the roster's construction though, I don't think being non-competitive was avoidable last year(without doing huge damage to 2013 and beyond), and being a contender this year likely wasn't possible without a crazy hit rate on new acquisitions. Starting next year it shouldn't be an issue(particularly since we'll start seeing some of the fruit of the farm system), but financial restrictions and further stagnation from young guys(we can't get combined 4.5 fWAR from Rizzo/Castro/Castillo again) might damage those chances.

 

I agree with pretty much all of that; I was never arguing for keeping the vets like it was some kind of salvation from sucking. And yeah, I don't think they went into 2012 thinking they were going to compete, but I don't think they were expecting/shooting for losing 100+ games.

[imb]

By their thinking right now, I wonder who all is in "the core"? My guess is Starlin, Rizzo, Shark, Castillo, and Wood at the major league level. With Javy, Almora, Soler, Bryant, CJ, and maybe Alcantara in the minors.

 

Meaning 1 out of 11 "core pieces" were acquired through trading the cancerous vets and 1 out of 11 acquired from being really bad at the major league level.

 

The point isnt that the core was acquired by trading off soriano, soto, whoever, it's that they weren't going to be able to add pieces with an old, expensive, bad roster. You can suck with Zambrano, Dempster, Garza, etc, or you can suck without them while acquiring something you think might help in the future. Why do you think Anibal Sanchez went to Detroit instead of Chicago? Maybe because Detroit is competing for a World Series and the cubs are trying not to lose 100 games.

[Sammy Sofa]

Who was arguing for the team to just hold on to all of the older players and not trade any of them?

[imb]

Who was arguing for the team to just hold on to all of the older players and not trade any of them?

 

uhh, no one? When has anyone even debated that

[Sammy Sofa]

Who was arguing for the team to just hold on to all of the older players and not trade any of them?

 

uhh, no one? When has anyone even debated that

 

You just said:

 

You can suck with Zambrano, Dempster, Garza, etc, or you can suck without them while acquiring something you think might help in the future.

 

...seemingly as if some people had been advocating the former. I guess I just took it the wrong way.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

I don't agree with the idea that we were doomed to suckiness no matter what was done, even with the financial restrictions.

[imb]

Who was arguing for the team to just hold on to all of the older players and not trade any of them?

 

uhh, no one? When has anyone even debated that

 

You just said:

 

You can suck with Zambrano, Dempster, Garza, etc, or you can suck without them while acquiring something you think might help in the future.

 

...seemingly as if some people had been advocating the former. I guess I just took it the wrong way.

 

Im saying that was the two options the front office faced. You can suck with your old, expensive, bad roster and lose 100 games and get nowhere or you can suck with a bunch of fill ins, trade the old guys for whatever you can get, lose 100 games but be making incremental progress.

[SouthSideRyan]

We're in wait and see mode there and will be for another year or two.

 

#heroin

[SouthSideRyan]

Who was arguing for the team to just hold on to all of the older players and not trade any of them?

 

uhh, no one? When has anyone even debated that

 

You just said:

 

You can suck with Zambrano, Dempster, Garza, etc, or you can suck without them while acquiring something you think might help in the future.

 

...seemingly as if some people had been advocating the former. I guess I just took it the wrong way.

 

Im saying that was the two options the front office faced. You can suck with your old, expensive, bad roster and lose 100 games and get nowhere or you can suck with a bunch of fill ins, trade the old guys for whatever you can get, lose 100 games but be making incremental progress.

 

Those weren't the only options though, unless you think everyone is like Sanchez and didn't want to sign with a terrible team.

[Sammy Sofa]

Who was arguing for the team to just hold on to all of the older players and not trade any of them?

 

uhh, no one? When has anyone even debated that

 

You just said:

 

You can suck with Zambrano, Dempster, Garza, etc, or you can suck without them while acquiring something you think might help in the future.

 

...seemingly as if some people had been advocating the former. I guess I just took it the wrong way.

 

Im saying that was the two options the front office faced. You can suck with your old, expensive, bad roster and lose 100 games and get nowhere or you can suck with a bunch of fill ins, trade the old guys for whatever you can get, lose 100 games but be making incremental progress.

 

I don't think it was even an option; they had financial restraints and nobody in their right mind would want the former.

[captain_kickass]

By their thinking right now, I wonder who all is in "the core"? My guess is Starlin, Rizzo, Shark, Castillo, and Wood at the major league level. With Javy, Almora, Soler, Bryant, CJ, and maybe Alcantara in the minors.

 

That's who I would say, along with Baez.

 

Rizzo and Castro need to figure it out, though. We're depending on those guys as cornerstones.

 

I have faith in Theo and Co. but if even they can't bring us to the promised land I think a lot of the fanbase is going to lose interest, and Wrigley will be what it was in the 80's when the Cubs were mostly terrible-- the world's biggest outdoor party, full of people there soley for the experience and to drink beer and look at the hot girls in bikinis, not for the team on the field.

[imb]

Who was arguing for the team to just hold on to all of the older players and not trade any of them?

 

uhh, no one? When has anyone even debated that

 

You just said:

 

You can suck with Zambrano, Dempster, Garza, etc, or you can suck without them while acquiring something you think might help in the future.

 

...seemingly as if some people had been advocating the former. I guess I just took it the wrong way.

 

Im saying that was the two options the front office faced. You can suck with your old, expensive, bad roster and lose 100 games and get nowhere or you can suck with a bunch of fill ins, trade the old guys for whatever you can get, lose 100 games but be making incremental progress.

 

Those weren't the only options though, unless you think everyone is like Sanchez and didn't want to sign with a terrible team.

 

I dont think anyone of significance would, especially since we weren't going to toss a soriano-esque contract at them.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

Im saying that was the two options the front office faced. You can suck with your old, expensive, bad roster and lose 100 games and get nowhere or you can suck with a bunch of fill ins, trade the old guys for whatever you can get, lose 100 games but be making incremental progress.

 

That is such a terrible opinion.

[captain_kickass]

Im saying that was the two options the front office faced. You can suck with your old, expensive, bad roster and lose 100 games and get nowhere or you can suck with a bunch of fill ins, trade the old guys for whatever you can get, lose 100 games but be making incremental progress.

 

That is such a terrible opinion.

 

I'm not really an imb fan, but I agree with him here. That's kind of how rebuilding works.