Amazing_Grace

Just a Southern thang: Yes, that's the South.

One would think that the pitching coach and manager would know if a pitcher is injured, but then, this is the organization that said Prior would be healthy this season. They didn't find his injury until about a month ago, after they'd been saying "he's fine" all spring.

No. At this point, I think it's very possible, even probable, there's some kind of underlying injury behind Z's struggles. Trading him would be a good option if he's not on the DL, Lilly and Marquis are still looking strong, and if there's a good deal possible. If not, you have to go to the end of the season with him. If he has a down year, at worst, you can bring him back on a 1 year deal at a reasonable price or maybe he'll even take a 4 year deal similar to what Lilly got. I was definitely in favor of resigning Z this offseason, but now I'm not so sure. There were a lot of people here that said no pitcher was worth what Zito got and that the Z deal being held up would end up a blessing in disguise and so far at least, it looks like they were right.

Yeah that shocked the hell out of me. It's probably way too late at this point for Hendry to save his job by changing his philosophy (he's done unless the team makes the playoffs this season and even that may not save him with new ownership coming in), but maybe he's finally learning something about the value of walks. It's the only time I can ever recall Hendry mentioning anything about anyone needing to take more walks, ever, at all. On topic, this was a necessary move. Jacque just needs to sit against lefties, and Pie needs to get playing time somewhere.

Where did goony post in this thread? I thought he got banned.

he will not seem like a bargain. If his number hold up, he will BE a bargain. This is true.

:D the thing about the payroll is it was Hendry who got the Cubs in the upper echelons of NL salary in the first place. I was actually just struck by the irony that the first point was "The bottom line". In so far as increasing the payroll goes, if spending more money didn't help than it can't be listed as an accomplishment. He spent a lot of that money on crappy bench players whose production could likely have been matched by cheaper options from the farm system. For example, what value does Henry Blanco bring to the team that they couldn't get out of Geovoni Soto? Why pay Neifi Perez 2 million to stink when Fontenot could have stunk for league minimum? as I said early on in my post, I don't like alot of the things he does, and over spending for replacement level players is one of them. but I think you know I am not talking about the Glendon Rusch's and Henry Blanco's. before Hendry, the Cubs assembled no talent. one, maybe two guys were big time players and paid as such. again, it's easy to say it doesn't mean anything, but assembling the talent on the rosters that Hendry has assembled simply did not happen pre-Hendry. there was ZERO legitimate hope before Hendry. before Hendry, there was pray for career years out of the entire roster. alot of people around here say that is still the case, but that's a load of BS. had the rosters Hendry assembled matched three year splits, or even come close, the playoffs would have been a regularity. as it turns out they did not, again mostly because of injuries. how about this. http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/CHC/1996.shtml you want to go back to those days? look at that crap. that was life as a Cub fan before Hendry. Yes, we're all aware the Cubs have had a lot of terrible teams a long time prior to Hendry's tenure. We haven't been to the World Series since Truman was President. The mid-90's Cubs were definitely some of the very worst we've seen. I'll not argue the point that those teams were worse than these in terms of raw talent. Nevertheless, sucking in the past is not an excuse for sucking in the present. This excuse has been used by a lot of Cubs regimes pre-Hendry. Sucking as a team with crappy players making league minimum is not better than sucking as a team with talented players making big bucks. If you lose 95 games, you lose 95 games; does it really matter that Jacque Jones has a better career OPS than Brian McRae or that Derrek Lee hits more homers than Mark Grace?

:lol:

If you go to cubs.com, you'll see they have a poll for who should be the fifth starter. For some reason, Sean Marshall is leading Angel Guzman. Is anyone else as confused as I am? Marshall basically had all of last year to prove himself and basically stunk most of the season. Guzman has been a top prospect with a long injury history but seems to finally be healthy and had a great spring. So who is picking Marshall in this poll anyway? http://chicago.cubs.mlb.com/index.jsp?c_id=chc

I criticized the Marquis signing as loudly as anyone here, but I have to admit I was wrong up to this point. Now, 2 months doesn't make a season and 2 months doesn't, by itself, justify a three-year contract, but if he continues to pitch this well, his contract will seem like a bargain.

Wade Miller for 3 wads of gum under the seats at Camden Yard.

Izturis out of the lineup today. HOORAY!!!

I'm looking for a GM who can put a team that consistently wins on the field, and by "wins", I don't mean I'm going to jump for joy at being over .500 for two straight seasons; I mean I'd like to see the team in contention within a couple games of the playoffs at least through July and August in most seasons. I'd also prefer a GM whose baseball philosophy isn't older than I am (I'm 26), as I think it's unlikely any GM who relies on the old "speed and defense" mentality and ignores the importance of OBP is going to win consistently.

And to keep him out of the Cubs lineup. :D Exactly.

We need Izturis to get hurt so that DL team will have someone to drive in runs with his glove.

LOL, Well, if I went over every single bad signing and bad trade and why it was dumb, the post would be so long no one would read it. I went with the most unforgiveable errors that he's consistently made, though I probably should add "not recognizing when a player is having an uncharacteristic career year and failing to realize regression to the mean is likely".

To break it down, here are the bullet points for why Hendry is a bad GM. 1.) Bottom line, he has a sub .500 record as GM with a top 5 payroll in the NL. That's unacceptable by most anyone's definition. 2.) He hired Dusty Baker, who refused to play young players when the Cubs had one of the best farm systems in all of baseball, abused our pitchers' arms, and taught young hitters a terrible approach to hitting. 3.) He signed middle relievers, who are, by definition, inconsistent and unpredictable, to multi-year multi-million dollar contracts. 4.) He consistently failed to address the team's greatest deficiency, lack of OBP over his entire tenure as GM. He ignores OBP altogether or else doesn't give it a high enough priority. He continues to sign an entire team of aggressive power or speed hitters and ignores the need to have some other kinds of hitters on the team. 5.) He has repeatedly signed or traded for bad to mediocre veterans in the decline phase of their careers to block young prospects, players such as Burnitz, Floyd, and Karros. 6.) He refused to ever put a check on Dusty Baker's abuse of young pitchers by ordering them put on pitch counts. Hendry was Baker's boss and it's his job to make sure he overrules his employees when they make decisions that cost the organization. 7.) He relied over and over again on players with long injury histories to be major contributors without having a suitable backup plan, and waited too long to bring in replacements when needed. 8.) Those who give him credit for "foreseeing" the improvement of Lee, Barrett, and Ramirez would do well to remember that he apparently DIDN'T foresee the decline in Juan Pierre, Glendon Rusch, Joe Borowski, Jeromy Burnitz, or Greg Maddux, nor obviously, did he foresee the injuries to Wood, Prior, and Nomar. He may have left Rich Hill untouchable, and that is to his credit, but he also gave up Ricky Nolasco AND Sergio Mitre for Juan Pierre (and only one year of Pierre thankfully). Those two might have made it unnecessary to sign Marquis and/or Lilly. If that isn't enough to convince people that Hendry is, at best, a mediocre GM, and, at worst, one of the worst in MLB, then I guess they can't be convinced. Sure, he found some good players. Every team has at least one or two guys that came in and did well. The odds dictate that you have some successes and some failures when you bring in players. You measure how good the team was overall by wins and losses, and the Cubs have had fewer wins per dollar than just about any team in baseball during Hendry's tenure. If that's not an indication of his failure, then what exactly does it indicate?

Am I the only one suspicious that Pie's friendship with Soriano has something to do with him staying on the team? Maybe Lou thinks that having a buddy will make Soriano play better, or maybe Soriano even asked him if Pie could stay? One thing seems clear, Soriano hasn't exactly been chomping at the bit to go back to CF after his minor injury.

Speaking as a Kentuckian and as a Cubs fan, I'd like to see a team in Louisville. I think it would be a great place to move a weak franchise like the Devil Rays or Marlins. It would be the only professional sports franchise in the city and in the entire state, and it would have a natural geographic rival in Cincinnati (2 hour drive). I don't think the union will ever allow contraction for a variety of reasons, but moving struggling teams might be worthwhile.

I nominate "Everything Falls Apart" by Dog's Eye View. The first line "Don't look now, things just got worse" epitomizes the life of the Cubs fan. I also have a couple ideas for Jim Hendry's theme song "Dare to be Stupid" by Al Yankovic or "Everything You Know is Wrong" also by Al Yankovic

I seriously cannot understand why some people continually insist upon defending Jim Hendry by dragging out every tired excuse in the book to try to explain why the Cubs should have done well but didn't. In this case, you're saying the injuries were his excuse. I'm not excusing Jim Hendry for the Cubs' collapse in 2006! It's 100% his fault that the team was unprepared for the adversity it ran into! It's also 100% Hendry's fault that Dusty was ever the manager, and continued in that role for so long! Hendry didn't acquire Cedeno, he came up through the Cubs' system. And Hairston was just a token in the Sosa deal. Hendry would've probably taken anyone to push that deal through. Agreed on the OBP. However that crap philosophy seems to have been adressed in the regime change, between Lou and Gerald Perry. This is a total lose-lose situation. Hendry loses if he doesn't spend money, and if he does spend it, there will always be someone who thinks he should've spent it differently. I wasn't crazy about the Soriano signing myself, but Carlos Lee would've been even worse IMO. And he *definitely* loses if he lets our own guys walk away for nothing (DLee, Ramirez, etc.). Put yourself back in February, and as you consider the need to sign Cliff Floyd, ask yourself... Who plays OF for the Cubs if Soriano gets hurt, and Pie isn't yet ready? In that event you've got Murton, Jones, and Angel Pagan playing every day, and it's goodbye, 2007 season. Who plays 1B if Derrek Lee gets hurt? Daryle Ward? Again, goodbye, 2007 season. Look Floyd isn't perfect. He's got injury issues, and age issues, and defensive issues. But he's a darn better everyday option than Pagan or Ward, and in the event that nobody gets hurt, he's still valuable as a part-time starter and a primary PH. And if he plays enough to trigger his option, it will mean two things -- one, we really needed him as insurance, and two, he played well enough to keep himself in the lineup when the need arose. Well, at least we can agree Hendry is a bad GM even if we disagree about Floyd. I didn't see the need for Floyd then and I still don't now. At the time, I assumed it meant Jones would be traded. As things turned out, that didn't happen. Maybe Jim tried to trade Jones and there really wasn't anybody out there that wanted him, but I suspect he asked for more than Jacque was worth out and then refused to deal him for the C prospects he was (and still is) worth out of the desire not to have to admit what a waste it was signing Jacque in the first place.

I think this is complete BS nonsense. The Cubs didn't lose because of a lack of depth. They lost because the team sucked, and the team sucked because the GM sucks. Hendry didn't rectify problems, he put together a patch work desperation plan hoping to get lucky and catch a down division. The Cubs sucked because their outfield couldn't produce, there were black holes in the lineup, and the pitching was shaky. Depth was not the problem. Not enough front line production, has been, and still is, the single greatest problem out there. You don't lose because of 4th outfielders and 5th starters. You lose because your best players just aren't good enough and your worst players are just too freaking terrible. You don't lose 90 games because of depth issues. You don't go 4 years with a top payroll for your league without ever winning 90 games because of depth issues. A GM doesn't have a sub .500 record because of depth issues. This isn't about having enough backup outfielders. It's about a clueless GM who can't realize he's making the same mistakes over and over and over again. Pretty hard to say what the 2006 Cubs would've been if all of their best players would've played. Unfortunately only 2 of the top 5 did. Lee, Prior, and Wood were all lost for the season, effectively. Their downfall was they had no contingency plan for these losses. They lost because their 5th starter became their #3, their #s 4 and 5 belonged in the minors, their 4th OF became their everyday 1B, and they had no viable "Plan B" for Cedeno and Hairston sucking. Those are depth issues, plain as day. Now the blame for all that most certainly falls on Jim Hendry, no doubt about that. Now you can argue whether or not Hendry has satisfactorily corrected the problem for 2007. But I don't see how simply subtracting Cliff Floyd off of this team makes anything better on any level. I seriously cannot understand why some people continually insist upon defending Jim Hendry by dragging out every tired excuse in the book to try to explain why the Cubs should have done well but didn't. In this case, you're saying the injuries were his excuse. Well, here's my counter. The two most important players that have been continually injured during Hendry's tenure are Wood and Prior, yet, despite knowing they were young, knowing they had a history of injuries, he STILL allowed Dusty Baker to run them out there for 120-130 pitch games on a regular basis when they were healthy. Were some of their injuries preventable. We'll never know but it sure would be interesting to see what a GM who had the testicular fortitude to stand up to his manager would have done in that situation. Besides, every team has injuries. Last year, Pujols was hurt some and Edmonds was hurt a lot. Dusty could have played Todd Walker more and Neifi/Bynum less. He didn't do it. Hendry hired Baker, and took way too long to let Baker go. Every stupid thing that Dusty did, Hendry is partially responsible for, just as my boss is partially responsible if I do a terrible job or make a bunch of the same dumb mistakes constantly. He hired Baker. That's strike one against him before anything else is even considered. You're also blaming Hendry for having no "Plan B" for Hairston and Cedeno sucking, but here's the problem with that logic. You're blaming him for the wrong thing. Good GMs acquire players that don't suck to begin with, or build a team that is strong enough overall, they can afford to have a couple guys have a down year or at least a slow start. The Cubs HAVE NOT DONE THIS. Blame him for acquiring the sucky players in the first place and not replacing them quickly enough. It's two problems, not just one. Hendry continues to make decisions that reflect a lack of understanding of the modern game and how to build a team. When you have Pujols, Rolen, and Edmonds as your 3,4,5, you can get away with Yadier Molina at catcher and the likes of Preston Wilson in your outfield. The Cubs middle of the order isn't close to as good as what the top offensive teams have no matter how you want to debate it. Of the current Cubs players, only 3 have ever put up an OPS above .900 over a full season, and only 1 has done it in more than one season (Ramirez). We haven't even gotten into the fact that OBP seems to be something totally beyond the grasp of our GM or that he gives multi-year, multimillion dollar contracts to middle relievers. The Cubs are giving huge contracts to guys that have had one big season. Derrek Lee may never repeat his 2005. Even with that season, his career OPS is .867. It wouldn't be at all surprising if last season, his line would have been an OPS around .850. It won't surprise me if that's what it is this season, because that's what the historical stats say it's likely to be. DeRosa and Soriano had great seasons last year. Will they repeat those numbers? These are not young players anymore, so which is more likely, a dramatic improvement or a career year? Jim gave each of these guys very good contracts given their stats and their histories. I preferred Carlos Lee to Soriano at the start of the offseason due to the better consistency of the former and his higher historical OBP. To return to the matter at hand, Hendry gave Floyd a heavily incentive laden contract. It could end up costing us if he plays a lot. Does anyone want to see Cliff Floyd starting in LF next year because he can't be moved and Lou will play him to avoid clubhouse problems, or would we enjoy seeing him cut and have that money that could have gone toward free agents, Z, and possibly ARod being payed to Floyd? Hendry KNEW he had signed Daryle Ward as a lefty off the bench. He KNEW he didn't have to trade Jones immediately. He KNEW DeRosa could play corner OF. He KNEW he had Angel Pagan capable of being a late inning defensive sub and occasional PH. He KNEW Felix Pie would likely be ready by midseason. He should have known his personnel well enough to realize he could try Theriot in the OF. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out a middle infielder can probably handle LF. Also, remember that he DIDN'T know that Soriano was going to play in CF, so he signed him as a 5th guy (with Murton, Soriano, Ward, DeRosa) to play the 2 corner OF slots, and that's assuming he thought of Jones as a CF, which certainly was not apparent at the time.

If Floyd wasn't here and Pie wasn't up, the OF would be Soriano, Murton and Jones, and I don't think many people would be clamoring for another guy. And if it was, it wouldn't be the redundent Floyd. Hendry bashers blame Hendry for the sub .500 record during his tenure because he is responsible for everything. Excusing him for one bad signing because he made another good one makes no sense. Exactly. The Floyd signing was unneccessary because we had sooo many guys that could play the corners. The fact that Jones can play CF made him more valuable so had I been in Hendry's shoes, I'd have passed on Floyd altogether. If you subtract Floyd and Pie, you still have 6 guys that can play the OF in Murton, Soriano, Jones, Theriot, DeRosa, and Ward.

OK I really understand that Piniella and Dusty are not the same manager and have several differences. That quote sounds like it came straight from Dusty's mouth without the "dude" There's one big difference. Piniella is worried about "clubhouse problems" while Dusty seemed to actually believe the veterans gave him a better chance to win. Remember that Lou has played Theriot at SS for several days now so there's some evidence that he will bench a veteran if they play badly enough. Hendry shouldn't have signed Floyd without first trading Jones. If he was going to keep Jones, there was no need to sign Floyd at all since we had already signed another lefty OF, Daryle Ward. It's that simple. Hendry continues to be one of the worst GMs in all of baseball and whether the Cubs win or lose this year, I hope the new owner this offseason fires him immediately.

The time has come. That time is now. Mr. Jim Hendry will you trade Jones now.