jjgman21

add in a bucket of chicken wings and half the people here things it should land Abreu.

Not true. It's not just Willis, it's the idea of trading good young prospects for mediocre veterans. I have no problem trading away prospects, even if they end up really good in a couple years. But when you do it, you better trade for really good veterans, and Pierre is not really good. well can we at least keep in mind that MacPhail was still the GM when that trade went down. and can we at least acknowledge that all three pitchers the Cubs traded for Pierre have had serious control issues, whereas Willis had excellent control when traded. "good prosepcts" afterall is extremely subjective, so let's stop pretending that all three of these guys are going to be in major league rotations any time soon. as I have said many times before, I don't particularly like the Pierre trade. however, not every GM will get every trade right. you have to give credit where credit is due, and the fact is, not one of Hendry's prospects for veteran trades have come back to haunt him. so please stop ranting like give away trades are a regular occurrence with Jim Hendry.

I'm not happy with alot of Hendry's moves this offseason, but remain confident the Cubs are a playoff caliber team if they can get .350 obp / .800 ops. out of right field. however, I think getting rid of Todd Walker would kill this season. essentially, my hope, confidence, and optimism that the Cubs will be a playoff caliber team rests with keeping Todd Walker at second base. if he gets rid of Walker and doesn't get significant return, I will join most of the rest of you in a seemingly endless rant on Jim Hendry.

I don't think they need Lugo over Cedeno to be a playoff team and don't understand alot of the fascination with Lugo. Lugo's a nice player, but not leaps and bounds better than Cedeno. he had one nice OBP year at age 29. other than that, he screams average shortstop. I tell you this right now, if the Cubs had Lugo and his usual .335 OBP in the two hole all year, and alot of the people chiming for him now would be screaming. Cedeno has an outstanding chance to match what Lugo usually does this year, if allowed to play. I know, a big if. even if not, with Cedeno gone, the Cubs have a choice for 2007. resign a 31 year old average shortstop to a three year deal, go with Neifi, or try to find a shortstop somewhere else when none will be available except Jack Wilson or Izturis. I'd just as soon pass on all three and stick with Cedeno.

I agree 100%. we are talking about a pitcher that has combined for 156 innings the past three years. and contrary to what has been said earlier, he's not in his early 20's, he turned 25 a few days ago (not that his age is the death of his potential). furthermore, if this trade is gutting the system for a player that isn't a difference maker (and for the record, I disagree that Huff wouldn't be a difference maker), what would happen to the system for a guy that is a difference maker? edit: this is posted before seeing what Tim wrote about misinterpreting. nonetheless, I think Guzman's greatest value to this team, considering the presence of Williams and Hill, is to ship him out. yes, players recover from injury, but rarely does a pitcher recover from labrum surgery and go onto have any sustained success.

I was kidding too, playing on him not actually answering. and I originally asked the question in an attempt to evaluate the veracity of the rumor. I think that's a fair question to ask, regardless of your taste of lenth of interrogation, not that I have ever seen an interrogation of someone who has posted here for a long time. Don's not going to make things up, so perhaps the context of the conversation would add to the believability and prompt us to watch this more closely than we had before.

would you mind elaborating on how you had access to this writer? No. you mean yes?

would you mind elaborating on how you had access to this writer?

I've been known to be an injury apologist for some position players, but usually not pitchers and certainly not Guzman. I would do this trade in a heartbeat and am shocked TB would even think of it. I can't believe Guzman's trade value is anywhere near that high and personally I would do better than that to get Huff, if not in quality, then in quantity. the guy hit a ton in the minors and proved he figured it out in the majors. he hasn't had any major injuries to account for his slip. any sabrs have some luck numbers for him? if this trade went down, I think it would be a classic Hendry fleecing.

he went to college, that's why is age is higher than you'd like it to be. i, for one, am kinda glad that dusty wasn't in charge of how he was used when he was 22-23. The problem here is that top college pitching prospects aren't supposed to take as long to be major league ready. (I'm not sure he applies as one, but for the sake of discussion...) The high school guys are considered to be more projects than the college guys. It doesn't apply to all college pitchers, because some of them just suck and aren't good enough for the big show. In Hill's case, it's taking too long for him to be major league dominant. He should be able to have stretches, even when he's still a little 'green' where he can dominate major league hitting. That's if he's as good as advertised. Of course the sample size we have is a bit too small, so the only way we'll know is to put him out there and roll the dice. The downside to that is if he gets man-handled by MLB hitters over the course of a few months - his value at age 26 will be nil. Best bet is probably to trade him now for the best possible MLB talent we can. Otherwise, its ____ or get off the pot for Rich Hill this year. well, i don't think that's the case. there's no doubt that hill's a late bloomer. but you can't argue w/ the #'s he put up last year, and his strikeout #'s have ALWAYS been out of this world. it's not like major league pitchers retire at 28...he's still got some time left regardless of what he does in the first few months of this season. if every gm in baseball was asking him about him at the winter meetings, i doubt it drops to no gm's asking about him in june...even if he struggles. I agree with your sentiment, but am not so quick to concede that Hill is a late bloomer. Prior, Mulder, and other college pitchers that make the majors in the blink of an eye are still a rarity, not the norm. in his first full year of pro ball Hill dominated low A. in his second year he was in high A, not as dominant but still very good and still had great preipherals. in his third full year in pro ball he corrected his biggest problem (walks), dominated the high minors, and made it to the major leagues. to me, Rich Hill is exacly where he should be and has a great chance to be a very good, and perhaps dominant, pitcher in the majors for 6-8 years. I think the problem is a disconnect with the career curve of major league pitchers. the greats tend to break into the majors at a younger age and last until they are older than most, but many pitchers who come out of high school and college don't break into the majors and start performing well until their mid 20's.

if I'm not mistaken, he left in a huff before because the Cubs wouldn't give hime the number of years he wanted. he actually took less in $/year to get the extra year or two out of Boston. with that kind of negotiating history with the Cubs, and him asking for three years, I don't see any kind of deal being struck. incidentally, Bill Mueller at one time was a young player that the manager of the Giants allowed to play.

why do you care if somebody doesn't like NY's post?

what a surprise, the cabal is all together on this. its a ridiculous statement because a lineup of Pierre Walker Lee Aram Bradley/Wilkerson/Green/Floyd/Huff Murton Barrett Cedeno is nothing to vomit at. it would easily be a top 3 offense in the National League. most probably 6 players with OPS over .800, possibly 3 over .900, and almost certainly 6-7 players with OBP's over .350. but we all know you guys will keep ranting how Hendry hasn't done his job until the lineup is Wilkerson Kent Lee Dunn Aram Abreu Tejada Veritek and at that point you'll start bitching that the Cubs didn't get Pujols to replace Lee, the shortstop's obp is too low, and they should have signed Clemens.

Some people bring something to the table, other don't. um.....he brings a lot more to the table than you do. play nice, boys i'm playing nice, merely responding to a ridiculous statement made regarding a respected member of this board. hey, it's my favorite phrase. what happened to "long-time?" it was a ridiculous statement...about another ridiculous statement. I'm sure NY earned his respect with better comments than this and by standing up for himself.

1. Babe Ruth 2. Roberto Clemente 3. Ted Williams if he's willing to switch to right field 4. Andre Dawson 5. Jose Canseco what's the point of this if we are not going to deal in reality?

I second that Pedro. I would put Wilkerson at 1 and then down the list. By the way Go Hawks. I know you have a distaste for him, but look at it this way, if he's injured or a freak show, you still have all the prospects to trade to get one of the other guys. you get any of the others now, and you're stuck with him the rest of the year, sucking or injured, with no prospects left to go get someone else.

1. Bradley 2. Floyd 3. Wilkerson 4. Huff 5. Green even if Abreu was available, my number one choice is Bradley. he's the only player that will be available for nothing or for spare parts (besides Sanders, yuck). keep the trading chips and the salary. get Bradley and keep Walker.

I think its every bit as bad. the difference is the subtleties. everyone in the world can see when one team is hammering the other in the paint without foul calls, while there are touch fouls called on the other end. with home plate umpiring, it's often times a matter of 1/2 of an inch, and what is outrageous is the media encourages it. "well Roger Clemens is going to get that pitch called. the batter needs to take a hack" or "if you're around the plate all the time, you're going to get those calls" or "he's called that pitch earlier in the game." NONSENSE!!! it doesn't matter if it's Pujols in the ninth at Coors and the tieing runner is on. a strike is a strike and a ball is a ball. (you know what I'm talking about Card fans.)

I think any discussion about predictions of the durability of Tejada must include the fact that he insists on playing in the Carribean WS every year. the guy doesn't take any time off from baseball and that additional wear and tear will hasten his decline, IMO.

I agree with you to an extent. But the Cards are in a far better off position then the Cubs to begin with. When you have Albert, Scott, Edgar (in the past), and Jim it is much easier to fill the holes with the likes of Taguchi, Matheny, et al. In the recent past the Cubs had Sammy and not much else. where I will give credit to Jocketty more than anything is his ability to cherry pick when nobody else even sees the orchard. He's landed McGuire, Edmonds, Rolen, Renteria, Williams and Walker for what amounts to Adam Kennedy, Braden Looper, Placido Polanco, and 1/3 of a year of Mike Timlin. but one thing I have always said about Jocketty is his in season trades always seem to be good moves, but the wrong moves. year after year he brings in more hitting when more pitching would have put them over the top.

he tells them "see these? these are birds on bats. throw the ball three inches off the corners and they'll be called strikes. now go have a career year." Unfortunately for the Cubs -- namely Greg Maddux -- these "rules" do not apply. ah so Card fans can recognize that some players have received the benefit of the call at some point in time, but never the Cards. no. never. like you guys have never whined about Bonds or Clemens getting corner calls against you. like you never saw a Yankees game between 1996-2000. Maddux hasn't received any favors in his two years back with the Cubs. how many times have we seen him start off the mound, only to have the call not go his way...and then the inning blows up in his face. a couple years ago, I looked into the Cards staff for, I think it was 2001, a year in which they had something like 15 different pitchers that also pitched for other teams that year or the following year. turns out, that each and every one of them were better as Cardinals, whether they were with another team before or after the Cardinals. another example, you'll note that the years the Cubs have performed their best in the recent past all followed an uproar over umpires. 1998 followed the strike/firing, 2001 followed the enforcement of the high strike, and 2003 followed the introduction of Questech. maybe coincidence. maybe not. you may want to attribute it to Duncan, but wouldn't you think that these pitchers would take Duncan's wisdom with them? at least a couple of them? nope. not one of them improved once they left the Cards. there has to be some other explanation. luck? maybe. umps? maybe. some of it may have to do with Duncan or the pitcher being washed up, but just because the umps give certain calls to certain players or teams doesn't mean there has to be a conspiracy. I recently had the chance to pick the brain of a high A umpire who is moving up to AA next year. he completely agrees with me. somehow, he finds himself not always being consistent and at times giving certain players or teams benefits that he doesn't give others. its nothing he's conscious of at the time, just something that happens in the moment. it happens in all sports guys. go ahead and get upset with me because I bring it up. that's legit, I admit that I whine. I personally am outraged by injustice at just about any level, so I vent. but to pretend it's not happening is completely disingenuous.

he tells them "see these? these are birds on bats. throw the ball three inches off the corners and they'll be called strikes. now go have a career year." Bitter? admitting?

he tells them "see these? these are birds on bats. throw the ball three inches off the corners and they'll be called strikes. now go have a career year."

according to ESPN news bottom line, "Tejada denies trade demand."

he recognized Dusty Baker was a bad manager even though he'd just been to a WS. if nothing else, that gives him one up on our GM.