TruffleShuffle

is this a joke? the P and the E stand for performance enhancing. like your performance will be enhanced if you use them.

vitters is 2-4 (both singles) in game 1. glad the hits are coming, but it would be nice to see some more power now. also that 9 BB/55 K is pretty fugly.

guys is 23 years old and has only one home run this year. seems like his plate discipline has taken a pretty big step forward this year but it's come at the expense of power. it seems like he was really unlucky on balls in play at tennessee and now has been lucky in daytona. i guess i just have concern that he's a marginal CF with too much of a pull tendency. i like searle's heavy fastball but don't like his K-rate. seems like a decent prospect but someone who needs to throw more strikes if he's going to be this hittable.

a fair amount of that is luck - he has a .374 BABIP. minor league splits has his luck-neutral line at .276/.375/.456/.831 - still very good but quite as strong as his "real life" line. most guys who strike out close to 20% of their ABs aren't going to hit .300 but check out his progression this year: 2007: MWL: 10.7 BB%, 30.0 K% NWL: 9.3 %%%, 24.3 K% 2008: MWL: 7.8 BB%, 24.1 K% NWL: 10.0 BB%, 25.0 K% 2009: MWL: 13.4 BB%, 18.6 K% big strides in both areas. the only area he hasn't made a big jump forward is power, but hopefully that will come.

frankly i'm ready to give up on this season so i'd leave gregg in that role, hope he piles up a bunch of pointless saves and then hope he signs with a team and gives us two early picks in next year's draft. i don't really expect the cubs to operate with that mindset though.

nobody gives up sandwich picks. they're picks that are created. these are players that were signed in 2006-07 to lose picks in the 2007 draft: first round picks lost for: Frank Catalanotto, Carlos Lee, Julio Lugo, Jason Schmidt, Gary Matthews Jr., Moises Alou second round picks lost for: Alfonso Soriano, Danys Baez, Jeff Suppan, Barry Zito, Roberto Hernandez, Woody Williams, Justin Speier so as you can see, MLB teams often don't make decisions with the amateur draft in mind.

probably. grabow's whip the last two years is about 1.50. that's bad. marshall is fine as a back of the rotation starter or a long reliever, but he's just not that good. he's too hittable and his control is spotty at times. you could flip flop him with gregg and still have the same issues, but nobody who could pitch 3-4 innings in an extra inning game. marmol is already used as an 8th inning setup man and fireman, so i don't see how his leverage would improve over gregg's. guzman is really the only guy that i'd bother putting in the closer role, and at this point i think it's a pretty good idea. the biggest downside is that there are a handful of dumb GM's who would pay gregg simply because of his "proven closer" label; if they yank gregg from the closer role there's a good chance he'll either not get offered arbitration after the season or be offered but not signed early enough to collect the draft picks for him. if you keep him in the closer role - risky, certainly - and he puts together a strong last 1.5 months, you've got a good chance of collecting two early draft picks for him, since he's likely to be a type A free agent.

yeah flaherty has to be at tennessee next year. if i understand the rules correctly, he'd be rule 5 eligible at the end of the 2010 season and it seems to me he's a guy who's advanced enough to get taken early and talented enough that you don't want to lose.

his last 10 games: 33 AB, 13 R, 16 H, 5 2B, 2 HR, 12 RBI, 12 BB, 3 K. that's a BA near .500 and a terrific OBP. his overall line is .307/.402/.496/.898... even if this his third crack at the MWL (i really don't count the first try, there was no way he'd be able to handle MWL pitching as a raw 19 year old) that's very impressive. he may be our best prospect without anyone really knowing it.

marmol's control has been a joke, guzman is a decent option but needs to be handled carefully because his arm is made of glass, marshall can't crack 88 mph with his fastball and would be facing mostly RH batters, and grabow has neutral splits and walks way too many people. you're giving these guys too much credit.

Maybe the Cardinals are just better than us? Are they Kyle Blanks better? Seriously, what happened to Gregg? The Cardinals have turned Ryan Franklin into steroid-era Eric Gagne and we picked up a supposedly half-decent closer and he has been awful. No homers given up last year until Ward and he's given up 12 this year. There is no explanation anyone can give me for such a dramatic spike. there's your answer.

You never appreciate the value of a good closer until you get one as bad as this. We have had our share of bad closers (06 Dempster, 04 Hawkins, etc) and it never fails to enrage me. I just can't help but think of how dominant Marmol looked in the 8th and wonder what would have happened if they just used him in the 9th. they'd probably be down 4-1 going into the 9th and never need a closer. the problem is the lack of quality bullpen arms, not gregg. our best closer option has walked one man per inning. that's not a good sign.

fannnnnnnnnnnnnntastic

3 IP, 0 H, 0 BB, 2 K, 5 GO/2 FO for carpenter so far.

i want the raiders to hire back that coordinator who was working at a bed and breakfast. find a position for art shell too, he was priceless.

the NFL doesn't but it does have problems like guys getting $10M a year before they've played a down in the league. i'm pretty sure that jake long became the highest paid OL in the game immediately after being drafted. their system is messed up to the point that teams have trouble trading the top 5 picks because of how expensive it is to sign them. i like the NBA system. make good money but not great in your first three years; if you've proven to be a great player then you'll get big dollars after that.

adam dunn hit only 16 home runs in his second full season in the MWL. jim thome didn't show much power until age 22. gary sheffield moved quickly but didn't show big home run power until age 23. burke has good size has the potential to add power down the road; it may just be a matter of a raw player learning to drive mistake pitches. even if he ends up as a 20 HR guy with 30-40 doubles and good defense and OBP, that's still a good corner outfielder.

yeah i didn't know if it would be the vikings, but i assumed that if he was entertaining thoughts of coming back despite his 37th decision to retire, he'd just go the vinny testaverde route and come back when someone's QB got hurt. if this was the brett favre of 5 or 10 years ago, i could understand bending over for him, but he's really not that great any more and he's just a distraction. go play backyard football in your wranglers and leave us alone.

with vitters gone, who would you say is the best offensive prospect in the chiefs lineup right now?

i like this idea too, although i'm not sure how easy it would be to get a taker for dempster's contract.

that is fantastic.

yeah but that's kinda what AAA is. in 2007 iowa's roster (especially offense) was loaded with prospects; this year it just happens to be a bunch of of retreads. it's more an indication of the pathetic 2004-05 drafts than it is a statement about jim hendry. someone has to play at that level, and you want a team like iowa to be competitive, even if there aren't a lot of prospects there. come the second half of next year i'd expect a lot more prospects to be playing there. yeah this is important. obviously it would be nice to develop a pujols or hanley ramirez, but ideally you will develop your bench and bullpen with cheap options from within, rather than dumping money into those areas. it certainly looks like there are a number of bullpen options close to the majors (gaub, stevens, perkins, parker, reinhard, samardzija, maestri, carrillo), robinson or clevenger could be adequate backup catchers, barney has a very good glove and looks like at least a decent offensive player, marquez smith is a potential utility guy. the depth has certainly improved this year. \ you may be right. pittsburgh's system is improved, houston is a joke, milwaukee is decent, the reds are below average, and the cards system sucks now that they've dealt away most of their prospects. in any case, with the payroll crunch and an aging roster, the cubs really need to draft well, sign well and develop talent from within to prevent some pretty lean years from 2010-13 or so.

1. vitters 2. castro 3. jay jax 4. cashner (could be #2 though... i'm pretty fluid on those three) 5. carpenter 6. brett jackson 7. h-j lee 8. kyler burke 9. dae eun rhee 10. flaherty 11. antigua 12. lemahieu 13. clevenger 14. barney 15. blake parker 16. archer 17. gaub 18. colvin 19. w. castillo 20. watkins 21. raley 22. m. smith 23. huseby 24. lake 25. searle i'm leaving off a lot of the newer foreign signings because i just don't know much about them or have any performance to base a ranking on.

not sure if this was posted before: valuing the cubs' farm system seems like a nice evaluation and i agree with the overall conclusions - the cubs have leaped from being one of the bottom 5 farm systems in the game to middle of the pack. burke is pretty exciting; next year we'll see if he is jumped to tennessee (he'd play pretty close to home) and how he fares against the more advanced pitching. i remember really liking his inclusion in the walker deal because he was a high-ceiling, high-risk prospect. we haven't had many of those types in the organization the past five years.

peoria finishes off a 15-0 beating :shock: jackson 4-6, 2 singles, double, homer flaherty 2-3, double, homer, HBP burke 1-4, double, 2 BB lemahieu 3-6 lake 3-5, double. team is playing great right now and a number of guys are emerging as exciting offensive prospects.