TruffleShuffle

personally, i think count chocula just like how his product fits with the boo-berry. you're getting a range of scariness from your breakfast cereals that most other products cannot hope to achieve.

well don't give him too much credit; he only did it once and it was partly out of necessity. but i would guess that 80-90% of managers would not have the creativity or the balls to make a move like this. i do really like that part in The Book; it's something that I had never really considered, but after reading what they said about it, hiding a pitcher in the outfield for one batter does make a lot of sense. you don't have to burn another reliever, and the chances of the ball being hit to him, and him being forced to make a tough play, are very small.

Yes and yes, especially if it means Marmol was moved for a serious impact player. Hording excess relievers while the team has gaping holes in everyday starting positions is just flat out stupid and supremely Cub-like. okay, well that's where you and i differ. it's not about hoarding excess relievers; you're making it sound like billy petrick and carlos marmol are just interchangeable parts. petrick would probably be a bad reliever; marmol is a very good one. i think the cubs can upgrade at SS (or CF, if Pie flames out) without dealing key pieces off this year's team.

Look at his dramatic and consistent away splits over his career: http://www.baseball-reference.com/pi/bsplit.cgi?n1=greenkh01&year=00 Stop pretending he isn't hampered by hitting in those giant ballparks out west for most games each season. i don't know who he was referring to, but it wasn't khalil greene. khalil is 28, not 29, he's had a hell of a lot more than 975 ABs, and his OPS is .756, not .683.

lol. and i gave one example (want more? jose reyes. hanley ramirez. khalil greene. miguel tejada. rafael furcal. derek jeter.) who were similarly "rushed" to the majors at or before the age of 23, but performed admirably at the big league level and were able to continue playing productively at that level. ronny spent basically a full season at West Tennessee and then half of a season at Iowa. That made nearly five seasons in the minor leagues. Many, many players - most, in fact - move more quickly through the system than that. Saying that Ronny was "rushed" to the big leagues isn't a fact; it's people using hindsight to try to explain why he was one of the worst players in baseball in 2006.

0-3? season(s) over.

my brain just exploded Did I not make my sarcasm clear there? not really, but i should've realized you know better from the FJM quote in your sig. my bad. adam dunn is the really puzzling name on this list. where on earth would he fit???

don't be so sure. he has the almighty "potential" and that allows him a lot longer rope. Are you really arguing that young players that have shown great success in the minors shouldn't be given more "rope" than players that have been average or bad in the minors and downright terrible in the majors in their peak years? not necessarily, especially if said player has used the rope to hang himself in previous years.

my brain just exploded

yeah the consternation and hand-wringing were because he was a first round draft pick, which is a rarity for relievers. he's not particularly good.

yeah but what if/when wood gets hurt? then your bullpen is: howry - reliably good wuertz - pretty good, but struggled down the stretch and his command can be spotty eyre - hurt; sucks when he is healthy pignatiello - unproven; might be useful against LH batters lieber - who knows? not really a relief pitcher. hart - looks pretty good so far, but again he is an unknown petrick/marshall? - who knows take marmol and wood out of the equation, and what is one of this team's big strengths becomes a pretty big question mark. do you feel good with wuertz becoming the primary setup man? eyre/piggy/lieber/hart handling 7th inning duties? i'm not sure that i do.

royce ring isn't good either. if you have two below-average pitchers, it's probably best to use them with the lefty/righty matchups as long as they do better against same-handed hitters (they do), and the hitters perform worse against same-handed pitchers (they do - nady in particular is mediocre against RHP but is excellent against LHP).

defensively this is certainly true. offensively, it depends on whether felix can make adjustments to big league pitching. if he cannot, then he will not be as good as lofton offensively.

You're not going to get anyone of Greene's level for just Marmol straight up. Again, unless it looks like he can be stretched into a starter, as good as he is, he's still just a reliever. He can help push a deal to completion in abi way, but he's not going to be the main part of the deal. And the others I mentioned? Murton is stuck as a man out of place, yet he's a great trade piece, especially with the Padres, who have shown interest in him. Cedeno would have to go becase the need the SS depth with Greene going, and the Cubs could handle that easily wih Greene coming back in return. I'd trade Marshall or Gallagher as the final part...I could really go either way. Bottom line, you're not going to get a quality and valuable player like Greene for nothing. You're severely overvaluing Marmol. i suspect a lot of trade partners would severely overvalue marmol, however. but likely not kevin towers, since he's smart. anyway, i would prefer not to trade arguably our best reliever for greene. yes it makes the team a lot better offensively, but i think the cubs would be better-served by trading spare parts (murton, marshall) and prospects (gallagher, and especially colvin since he's gonna suck) than significant contributors to the current team. teams that aspire to win the world series do not trade their best pieces in the bullpen.

it still blows my mind that the hawks have not been on tv. that is something i just take for granted.

don't be so sure. he has the almighty "potential" and that allows him a lot longer rope.

my mistake on the announcing. it was paul steigerwald and bob errey who are currently the tv announcers, and they are terrible. i don't hear pens' radio broadcasts often, but mike lange is probably still good. he was good when i watched a few pens' games on tv, certainly one-sided toward the pens, but he knows the game and brings life to what was, for several years, a pretty lifeless franchise. here are some opinions on steigerwald and errey; most were taken from the hockey's future boards. even most pittsburgh people don't like them. it's really too bad that FSN Pittsburgh fired lange and replaced him with two ignorant boobs. apparently it was a "business decision," but i don't know how it's good business to fire a very popular, highly-respected commentator after 30 years of service to that team and that city.

This was in the "other games thread" but I felt it deserved some attention of its own. Another reason why Bobby Cox is a great manager... and it almost worked: Positional tomfoolery in the Pirates/Braves game tonight. Reliever Chris Resop enters the game in the 10th and walks two batters sandwiched around a sac bunt. (note - at this point there are runners on 1st and 3rd with 1 out) He then goes out and plays left field after being relieved by Royce Ring (LHP put in to face a LH batter), who registers a strikeout. Ring is then taken out, Resop returns to the mound from left field (he was replaced in left by Gregor Blanco) and surrenders the go-ahead run, becoming the first player in 15 years to pitch, move to a position and then pitch again in the same game. A little more background - the Braves were very thin at reliever because Mike Hampton shockingly got hurt in pre-game, so that was the only way they were gonna be able to go lefty/righty against the LH/RH batters was if Resop stayed in the game while Ring pithed to LaRoche. Given that LaRoche hits righties better and tends to struggle mightily early in the season - his career OPS in March/April is about 200 points below his OPS in all other months - I think it was a great move that showed some great creativity by Bobby Cox.

both guys are prone to giving up home runs, so one would think that the advantage of the wind blowing in will be about equal for hill and sampson.

i prefer to use two or three years of minor league experience over half a season of small sample size.

not only that, but hampton had been consistently healthy for much of his career. if you're going to take a risk on a long-term contract for a pitcher, he wasn't a bad option. johan santana is easily the best in that department - clean delivery, good bill of health - but hampton wasn't bad either. plus he was a good athlete and an outstanding hitter for a pitcher, which add more value to the already-good pitching. i'd argue that pierre had value in 2003 and 2004 when he was getting on base a lot for florida, but those days were long past when he signed with the dodgers, so that doesn't make it any less bad of a contract.

yeah they're really going to regret having him under their control throughout his prime. lord knows years 26-31 are when players start to really suck and make you regret signing them. i'll give you a break though, i'm sure you just read others opinions on contracts and tried making your own conclusions. Breaking News: Cubs sign first round pick to a 6-year ameteur contract "wow 6 years is a bit much..." wow ok. angry/bitter much? his MORP for those 6 years is $58,500,000, so the contract would be pretty fair. he doesn't walk enough for my tastes, but he's a plus defender and maybe he can turn a few more of those doubles into homers. if vernon wells could ever show some consistency from year to year, this would be a great OF tandem, but it's looking like vernon is following the jermaine dye career path.

i'm sure Beastley would do that on the offensive ended. i think hansbrough would do fine offensively though.

Tyler likes threesomes? but only with bar maids and middle-aged hags apparently

Now that is hard hitting journalism. this is seriously idiotic. i think beasley should win PoY, but tyler hansbrough has been an outstanding player all year. i don't think it's necessary to disparage hansbrough in order to make the point that beasley should be PoY. and i don't even understand what the hell he's trying to get at with his analogy there.