KingKongvs.Godzilla

That doesn't answer the question though. There aren't too many established guys who get asked to move that I can think of. There's always talk of a move a'comin, but I can't remember too many guys actually making the move. While I agree that moving Kemp from CF to RF isn't asking anything crazy and it's one I've been pushing as much as anyone, I just don't think it's something that's likely. There's a team who'll pay the price for him to man CF for them.

1. Yes, there would be a competition for Upton. Don't disagree there. He's one of the most hyped prospects of the last 10 years who looks like he'll truly live up to the hype. 2. Personally, you underestimate the farm system and overestimate most others. That's not something I can prove directly because farm systems tend to be a subjective thing, but I don't believe there are too many high end farm systems in baseball lately. Teams like the Rangers and Blue Jays (another team who could probably use a strong 2012 for talent to separate itself) would be the Cubs' main competition, and I'm not sure I'd lose too much sleep over that. I'd just focus on what the Cubs can offer, and it's really not as bad as most would think if they dedicated a thought to it. There's alot of guys in this system who's strong 2012 can give this system a huge boost in any rankings because there's tools and upside all over the place (especially with positional talent). 3. I think it's safe to say you're right on the costing more than Garza assumption. I also think it's safe to say that that wasn't my point when bringing up Garza. The Cubs will pay a good price for talent they want is the point, and it's something most smaller market teams pay attention to. That's one of the reasons the Yankees and Red Sox often get who they want on the trade market. They pay very well for it, and don't have to complain about getting ripped off because they have the money to back that (go out and sign some IFAs, pay a little extra in the draft and bring in a new crop to eventually harvest). 4. How often does a big name played move off of position? How often does it end well? The last one that I truly remember is the Jose Reyes situation back when the Mets signed Kaz Matsui, and Reyes was not yet established enough as a big leaguer to have any significant say. Our own Soriano was asked to move from LF to CF, but that was to increase his value and make it seem like he was worth 138 million. It didn't work out anyway. While Kemp would already be paid in your scenario, we're still talking about an MLB veteran in his prime who's settled and established himself within the game as a CF. It's not going to be a simple or easy move, and it's one that might frustrate this new big money bat. I'm a don't piss off the talent guy... I agree on your point about my timeline. Upton is probably a 2013/2014 guy, but I felt like saying 2012/2013 just to establish that I'd rather pay for him than Kemp. I know that changes the argument a little, and I apologize for that but I never intended to really go into detail with anything after I said 2012/2013. Hell, I thought we were just playing fantasy OF scenario and both of us were being a little tongue in cheek. Lot of words.

I've mentioned LeMaheieu's name several times in the past few pages of this thread as an option as well. I'm focusing mainly on Flaherty, though, as my hope is that LeMaheieu will work his way into playing time at second base next year. Oh sorry. Stoner. Still can't say I'm much of a Flaherty fan, especially as someone being handed most of a platoon ABs.

That's going to be tough to do seeing as he'd be blocked by the big Justin Upton trade of 2012/2013. Why are the Diamondbacks going to be doing such a thing? Yeah, he's going to be getting a lot more expensive, but he'd be under control for three more seasons if they trade him at that point. I doubt they want to pay him, but if he has another year like this or better teams are going to be foaming at the mouth coming after him. What type of package are the Cubs likely able to come up with (and more importantly, one they can spare) to get him under such circumstances? Yeah well....g'luck moving Kemp out of CF. As far as a package...I actually think with a good 2012 the Cubs will be in at least a decent position to make a blockbuster trade. The system has talent, it's just mostly talent that hasn't broken out. We also saw in the Garza trade that the Cubs are willing to pay a good price for talent they want. The D'Backs will lose their 4 best non-Upton position players by 2014, including their starting middle infield by next year. So there's an outside shot...A long outside shot...but yeah otherwise that's the player I want.

Do you think Jeffrey Baez will be stateside next year? It's clear that there's way more positional talent in the system than pitching talent. That may be a good thing.

That's going to be tough to do seeing as he'd be blocked by the big Justin Upton trade of 2012/2013.

Despite the ridiculous season he's probably the #3 Dodgers story to the ownership situation and Clayton Kershaw. Then he might not even be the best/most exciting young OFer in the division. Justin Upton is 3 years younger, had more hype coming into the big leagues, and is putting up close to a 7 WAR season as a 23(!) year old. I can't say I'm a Kemp fan (mostly because I think he's a choppy CF who's more of a COF going to get franchise CF money to play CF), but it's definitely not fair. If he was on the Yankees or Red Sox doing this... Edit: Speaking of Upton...in doing "research" for this post I found out his BABIP of .320 is actually below his career norm (.332 or .333 I forget). The upside in this guy....

That's pretty sick, and I do hope he gets it too. Can you believe that a .987 OPS leads the league? It's been TWENTY YEARS since Barry Bonds led the NL with a sub-1.000 OPS. Think we're in a new era of baseball?

Because Ricketts' words seem to indicate that, at best, the payroll will be staying about the same and any extra money goes into the farm system for the immediate future. Which ones? I've heard this, but I've never heard anything actually cited. I think he'd be willing to bump up payroll if it helped the team win sooner rather than later. I mean looking at the current roster there's a pretty healthy balance of just out of prime (Ramirez, Soriano, Wood, Byrd, Dempster, Marmol?), prime (Soto, Marshall, Garza, Wells, Marmol?, Baker), solid pre-prime talent (Castro, Barney, Shark, Russell, DeWitt?), some more pre-prime guys who show some signs of being competent in some capacity with plenty of room to grow (Colvin, LeMahieu, DeWitt), and then close to ready to help prospects (Jackson, Flaherty, Carpenter, Dolis, Cabrera, I'll throw Cashner in this one). It's a team that's begging for a couple of elite talents to help stabilize the situation...and given the payoff Ricketts (and all of us, but he gets most of the money) could see by throwing a little extra money into the big league club....

Which Baez went 2-5, the highly talented/tools laden first round pick or the highly talented/tools laden IFA? Forget it just read....Didn't notice Austin Reed was involved in Fall Instructs, but I like it. That guy's stats seriously sucked this year, and it's good to see he opened up with a strong 1.1 (4 groundouts).

Golden is pretty athletic himself (I must have forgotten his name up there), but I could see your point on Burgess. His problem to me is that it turns out he's not very good, but with two useful skills (power and patience) that give him the outside shot at ending up an OF bench bat type. Apparently he's not bad defensive either, but he's also not good or better.

Study Branch Rickey. Overall, you've got me there. I'd still rather not lose a really good player to downgrade to a 25 year old rookie/Jeff Baker platoon. There's got to be a better idea than that. Nor do I think that would help in pursuing those FAs. I also think it'd be weird to sign two top tier FAs while weakening an already pretty bad team (after Ramirez and Castro the next best bat is good year Soto, then whoever you want to pick between Byrd/Soriano). If they let Ramirez go then an idea more reliable than Flaherty/Baker would have to come into play. Also, how can a prospect be handed the majority of 3B PAs/ABs and LeMahieu's not even in the conversation to be that guy?

Young CFs/athletic OFs in the system...there's alot of them: Colvin Brett Jackson Matt Szczur Jae Hoon Ha Zeke DeVoss Abner Abreu Michael Burgess Pin Chieh Chen Evan Crawford Jeffery Baez Dunston Jr. Taiwan Easterling Garrertt Schlect Darien Martin

This, especially what's in bold. It'd cause a slight raise over this year's payroll probably/maybe, but it'd be worth it because the team would be significantly better sooner going this route. Fielder/Ramirez/Castro would be one of the best offensive infield trios in baseball. Didn't the Cubs wait a good 30 years for a 3B as good as Ramirez? Why lose him when he's still a pretty damn good hitter/player?

And my contention is, that's completely absurd. The second half describes an actual aspect of a scout's job. Ok? Yeah on the re-read that goes nowhere. That was worthless. Oh well, toodle-oo then.

And my contention is, that's completely absurd. The second half describes an actual aspect of a scout's job.

Has anything been written about Austin Reed? He was a little iffy mechanically but I liked him as much as Wells last year. Crap numbers but did he at least improve in some other aspect like conditioning or mechanics?

Couple things about Golden that makes me like him more than I usually like guys who profile like him: He's a Cub so that bias is there. He walks. I read little things...good effort on D and stop pulling off like it says up there so he's less exposed to a good fastball and breaking balls away. I liked his old draft video more than I thought I would. Good athlete 4 sure. Actually a couple of those reasons are why I still think Michael Burgess can end up a Marcus Thames type. You don't hear about a bad attitude or work ethic, which is a huge plus. Effort is put in, they walk...Anyway Golden profiles slot like Burgess did in his draft year, without the delays Burgess has had in his development (hasn't reached AA yet). Anyway: Wells is sounding like a Jake Westbrook type, but he's got plenty of projection left to go higher. I like Chen more than most, in a possible Reed Johnson type kind of way.

I watched this start....pitcher porn. Moore is just filthy. He faced the Yankees' D lineup, but the fastball was consistently 94-95, he had a changeup, and while the breaking ball wasn't perfect when he buried it there was no shot. Definitely some scary good stuff and seeing what he can do over a full season will be interesting. If they make the playoffs he might play the same role Price played in '08.

+1 I'm waiting to get high on Baez, another CF prospect. There's even a couple pitchers, maybe even one with high upside as a starter. This system could use a couple more of those.

http://shop.customscooters.com/images/razorparts/on_off_button.jpg For the love of Jah please...There's only so much going nowhere conversation can entertain in a night....There's two paragraphs there that answers your question that doesn't mention a word of CJ Wilson. If it doesn't satisfy you say so so I can file it with my Department of Care. At the very least pretend you're doing something more than just being annoying.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ytCEuuW2_A

Somewhat of a career year weirdly morphed with a return to his younger self after a couple years of being a little off. His HR/FB% returned 11.whatever, groundballs came back, the LOB% was a career high after a career low, his BABIP was a big career low after a big career high, his K's went up but the K:BB wasn't as strong....Basically he's probably very close to the pitcher he is right now but not quite *this* good. He's plenty good if you're looking for a pseudo-ace/#2 type (~4-5 WAR) , but specifically for the Cubs I think they already made that trade. I wouldn't argue too hard on him not having untapped potential, because he's the kind of junk balling RH who could pull off maybe a better season (especially in the NL), maybe even two. I just don't think it's all that likely. He's kind of in a perfect storm right now as he pitches for a very strong defensive team in a very strong pitchers park in a run depressed league. I know that I dismissed this heavily for Garza, but I did that because my eyes told me (as well as the numbers actually) that Garza's fastball and breaking balls were better pitches and I'd always take a hard thrower over a finesse guy given that both are healthy, young, MLB starters already. I think power guys age with better stuff, and can last longer into their 30's. Mostly though, I decided in context of the Cubs, who I feel should be chasing bigger fish right now. CJ Wilson's a better pseudo-ace for instance, and he's LH and would only cost money. That's where my focus on a high end pitcher would be, with young power arms as the goal.

Stop being paranoid, stoner. I wasn't being passive aggressive about what people think I think here. BS is just what I call cliches, which are still capable of offering insight if you want it so I used it. As far as my stance on numbers...I'm just annoyed at how easy anyone can play with them if you want. In this thread I'm more insulted for statheads, as the "analysis" offered here is nothing but an idea watered down to it's most basic thought and analysis and presented as The Truth. No real stathead would have an issue with 4 starts between two well conditioned veterans resulting in 120+ pitches, bad team or not. This is particularly true given how each performed in those 4 games, particularly the latest one.

Yeah, enough with the Prior. Get over it. Garza is not Mark Prior. To hopefully help catch up those still stuck in 2003 with Prior, because I know it's not just this guy...Le Futur: http://www.usatoday.com/sports/baseball/columnist/thorne/2009-04-26-thorne-column_N.htm As far as the analysis: even if I mis-read (I did), what's the significance of the data? What's it supposed to mean? Why did the Tigers let Verlander throw 120 in 6 out of 7 starts to close last year when their games were "meaningless?" What's the significance of that data? Which is more significant in their implications? Why is Verlander's arm still attached today? HOW DID HE LIIIIIIIIVE!?!?!?? Garza didn't even struggle today after the 3rd...this is such a stupid [expletive] argument.