TruffleShuffle

adrian beltre just got a 6 year $96 million contract last offseason and you think that aramis ramirez is going to take a 3 year $25 million offer from the cubs.

Nice to see that at least one person recognized the moment (if half-heartedly). I'm a little disappointed in this place. Wherever he ends up, it's quite a story that deserves recognition. nobody is recognizing anything that happens during cubs games because the team is awful and most of us don't bother wasting our time watching games that are meaningless to the team that we support. plus we are not The Best Fans in Baseball™ so we're not required to politely admire the accomplishments of opposing players.

strip duke of every title they've ever won.

matt holliday needs a baseball in the back during this game.

to me it really depends on what's going on behind the scenes. if teams are basically taking a dump in a paper bag and offering that for pena and his whole salary, then i'm glad that hendry is telling them to screw off. there's possibility that a better trade opportunity arises and even if it doesn't, they might be able to offer him arbitration and get a sandwich pick. but if there are teams that are interested in guys like baker, pena, byrd, etc and hendry is just telling them that they're not on the market, then that would be really stupid and incompetent.

hopefully furcal plays really well over the last 2 months and the cards are dumb enough to pick up his 2012 option.

think i'll just keep bumping this every few days

i'm willing to trade my entire team.

yeah but derrek lee can't hit any more.

jeez su-min jung is just a mess.

probably would've given us pedro alvarez, luis heredia and jameson taillon for pena. HENDRRRRRRRRYYYYYYYYY [shakes fist at sky]

is this a joke?

yeah, i could see why someone would jump at the opportunity, but i could see why someone would also pass. the guy has played for 3 organizations in 2 years, maybe he just doesn't like moving around.

let's make a bet - i say carlos pena will not be the cubs' starting 1b through 2015. you say he will be. loser has to stop posting on nsbb.

this team [expletive] sucks

pretty nice deal for colorado.... makes some sense for cleveland too, given his contract. as a kipnis owner in a keeper fantasy league i got momentarily excited about him moving from a pitcher's park to coors field.

didn't know you were that kind of guy

hell if he'd watch more 30 minutes more game tape and hustle like crazy in the outfield and practice his bunting more, he'd probably be challenging ted williams for greatest LF of all time.

Well, sure. But that seems like sort of an unfair scenario you've set up. There's no guarantee that hanging onto prospects, rather than trading them, will make a team "great" for 10-15 years. There's no guarantee that the Phillies will even win one world series either from these moves. It is playing the percentages. what percentage chance does it add to the phillies being "great" for 10-15 years by hanging onto singleton and cosart? yes, ideally it would be nice to keep a core together for a long time, then when those guys retire you just plug a ready-made prospect in to replace their production. but when does that ever happen? the phillies aren't going to have another chase utley sitting around in AAA waiting for the real chase utley to get old and retire. and as for the pence trade, it makes a lot of sense. the phillies' offense has been really average this year. against LHP the team OPS this season is .661. they struggled offensively against the giants last postseason, and just got done failing to score an earned run against lincecum and cain in a recent series. ibanez' contract is expiring after this season and they had a need for a RH bat in the corner OF. this isn't a one-year rental, it's a trade for a guy who will be under team control for two more years and will fit in nicely with all the LH bats the phillies have. if pence were 31 and a free agent after this year you'd have a lot easier time arguing that they should stop giving away the future for a piece that represents a fairly minor upgrade.

it doesn't really matter that much if your team is getting old if they're still good. halladay is 7 years past most baseball players' peak ages and is the best pitcher in baseball. cliff lee is not far behind him. utley is still one of the best 2b in baseball. victorino is one of the best cf. i guess you can hand-wring about what will happen when your players reach free agency, whether they'll be overpaid or worth keeping, but the phillies are going to win the NL east for the 5th year in a row, they've won two pennants and one world series, they're favorites to make the world series again this year, and on paper they're expected to be very good next year. if you can be the best team in your league for a six-year stretch and win at least one championship, why would you piss away that chance because you don't want to give up kyle drabek or jonathon singleton? plus i don't know what your suggestion is for "making this team a little better while making sure they had some plan beyond the next year or two." nobody is looking to trade tim lincecum or felix hernandez. roy halladay was available and they went out and got him for a price that looks pretty modest in hindsight. the price they paid for oswalt wasn't too bad either, selling high on j.a. happ. pence looks to be part of the team for the next 2+ years. i just don't see where you think they're improving the team significantly without paying a price in prospects. very few teams are trading good 20-something players, and the team that did trade one just gave their best player to the phillies.

yeah, the focus should be on signing the right players to long-term deals, not being afraid that some guy will turn into a pumpkin 5 minutes after you sign him. any contract can be a terrible one - soriano's is terrible, but so was jason schmidt's... that was basically $0 worth of production for $47 million worth of payment. if we sign, say, pujols to a $250 million contract and we get $220 million worth of production, who gives a [expletive]? the problem is if you get $50 million of production, then the contract is a disaster.

plus they also didn't overpay him by that much. given that the derek lowes of the world are making $15 million, someone was going to give dempster a contract close to the one he got. he was never going to sign a 3 year deal for like $30 million unless he felt some crazy loyalty and just loved chicago.

what the [expletive]???

i liked the pick of zych but don't think he's worth second round money - he hasn't been dominant and he's a junior, so if he goes back to school and doesn't have a good year, he'll be drafted as a college senior and be lucky to get slot at wherever he's drafted. that being said, i'm not a fan of wasting early round picks either... hopefully his demands come down a bit and they sign him for a little over slot.

well now they have a second, because pence isn't a free agent until after the 2013 season. i like this trade a lot for philly. they didn't give up brown (the offer was never brown/singleton/cosart), didn't give up worley (who will probably be the #5 next year), singleton was always going to be blocked by howard... basically ibanez goes away after this year and they've got pence, victorino and brown in the OF for another year or two. it's not paying big for a one year rental, they'll have the same loaded SP core next year (hamels is RFA - possibly traded?) and the same offensive core, possibly minus rollins. but the point remains that their window will remain very open next year and probably into 2013, and even when their window closes with their current core of talent, they've been so successful that they're now run like a very large market team and have the resources to improve quickly.