Illini Iceman

They don't care about the baseball records. They care that he lied to in an attempt help Victor Conte get off the hook on the case they really cared about. Sets a bad precedent if they let people lie to a federal grand jury to save their friends in a high profile case like this and then don't punish them for it. If Barry Bonds was Marvin Benard, the feds wouldn't give a Veterans Committee. They're nailing him to the wall cause he dared to break the HR record. Wrong. They are "nailing him to the wall" because he is very high profile witness who a large part of the general public knows is snubbing his nose at the Feds by blatantly lying ang being smug about it. If they had just let him do it they would look like a bunch of chumps and whoever they subpoena to testify down the road would know that they can lie and say whatever they want and not worry about the consequences.

They don't care about the baseball records. They care that he lied to in an attempt help Victor Conte get off the hook on the case they really cared about. Sets a bad precedent if they let people lie to a federal grand jury to save their friends in a high profile case like this and then don't punish them for it.

Fukudome is still in the lineup (against RHP, so for the majority of the games) so Bradley isn't replacing him. He's basically replacing Edmonds. Fontenot is replacing DeRosa. And our bullpen is probably worse than last year. Damn, no Eyre or Howry. Or Wood Plus Eyre was really good for the Phillies. I'd love to have him back All Eyre and Marquis had to do was be traded to go from NSBB whipping boys to beloved quality pitchers. When Eyre was still on the team and not being used, many people here were wondering why, and many people were wondering why we dumped him. He only gave up 1 run in his first 10.1 IP last season, then he had 3 straight bad games and they just quit on him. That's when he went to Philly and was light out. Also he had a .74 ERA over his last 30 games (24.1 IP) of 2007. He would have good stretches. And then turn to crap so you couldn't trust him any more except for mop up work. I would say that the 7.15 ERA and 1.71 WHIP while with the Cubs is why they quit on him. But hey, I am sure he really is great and a guy like Gregg is completely useless junk.

Fukudome is still in the lineup (against RHP, so for the majority of the games) so Bradley isn't replacing him. He's basically replacing Edmonds. Fontenot is replacing DeRosa. And our bullpen is probably worse than last year. Damn, no Eyre or Howry. Or Kerry Wood... So now Hendry is fitting DeRosa and Wood into his budget? Yeah, I'm sorry he should have kept them and not given Dempster and Bradley those crazy contracts. Then we could be complaining about Marquis being our fourth starter and Gaithright/Johnson platooning in CF and Fukudome every day in RF.

Fukudome is still in the lineup (against RHP, so for the majority of the games) so Bradley isn't replacing him. He's basically replacing Edmonds. Fontenot is replacing DeRosa. And our bullpen is probably worse than last year. Damn, no Eyre or Howry. Or Wood Plus Eyre was really good for the Phillies. I'd love to have him back All Eyre and Marquis had to do was be traded to go from NSBB whipping boys to beloved quality pitchers.

It's risk/reward. What's the benefit to trading away Hill? You get a low A reliever. Even if there's a 5% chance that Hill can contribute something this year, that's a better bet than the PTBNL turning into anything. So how long are you going to carry him on the roster this year hoping that the light comes on and he contributes?

Fukudome is still in the lineup (against RHP, so for the majority of the games) so Bradley isn't replacing him. He's basically replacing Edmonds. Fontenot is replacing DeRosa. And our bullpen is probably worse than last year. Damn, no Eyre or Howry.

I know this is fun to say and all but at this point he only has 3 MIF on the 40 man roster and obviously in order to actually field a team the minimum you need is 2.

Why does this mean Hendry is a failure? He didn't have to have Peavy, and when it came down to it, he likely didn't have the money to spend on him. Cmon, the entire offseason has been a failure. This ballclub did NOT improve in the offseason. We coulden't scratch out any runs in the playoffs for two years in a row. Jim Hendry is a giant failure. If 3 playoff appearances in 6 years is a giant failure, what do you call the previous 60 years of Cubs GMs? I have my serious gripes with Hendry as well, but theres no need for a massive overreaction. Obviously they weren't any better, but he has a point about the offseason. The Cubs were supposed to be able to increase their salary this year, and really haven't improved much. Every GM's job is to look to upgrade the team going into the next year. Instead Hendry is shopping in the bargain bin and picking up junk. It appears that he is flailing around hoping that by just making moves he will improve the team. Gregg < Wood, Miles < DeRosa, Bako < Soto, Gathright < Ward or Pie. The only upgrade so far appears to be Bradley, who is a monster when healthy. The problem is that Hendry paid him more than any other team was willing to pay and we have to pray that all is decent that Bradley miraculously stays healthy all year. Now we are hearing names like Looper and Wolf? So maybe cubbyvirus should have said that the great majority of this offseason has been a failure, to be more accurate. If that really was a move that Hendry made then I would agree with your point.

So basically, this means that if Hill does good there, we get something decent, but if he sucks up the joint, we get garbage? Thats the dumbest thing Ive ever heard. How about I go out and buy a lottery ticket, and how much I pay hinges on if I win. Just keep the damn guy, and if he sucks, let him go. If Baltimore still wants him then, more power to them. So you think those 6 weeks of spring training are going to pretty much tell the tale, huh? it's a guy whose control pretty much disappeared overnight, so yeah, 6 weeks probably could tell the tale. What tale would it tell? That he found his control during spring training and could lose it "overnight" again? The Cubs have obviously seen a lot of him over the last 12 months between spring training / MLB / AAA / winter league and if there was something they were confident they could fix and that it would stick they would have done it by now and would not be looking to move him.

Doesn't matter that Fontenot actually put up better numbers in his playing time last year than DeRosa. DeRosa is a veteran, dude, so you got trust the vets if you want to win. Maybe Fontenot won't be able to cut it, but I don't see the big uproar about giving him a shot. I still prefer Fontenot / Bradley / Fukudome to DeRosa / Fukudome / Johnson if Hendry really had to make the move to clear some payroll. With an unlimited budget clearly DeRosa + Bradley makes the team better than Bradley without DeRosa but Hendry is not so clueless that he does not know that. He must have been under some pressure to move DeRosa if he was going to be allowed to sign Bradley. Also, everyone was pretty excited about Fukudome coming over here last offseason. While I know he struggled in the second half of the season I don't know why it is suddenly inconceivable that he could provide pretty good production out of CF, especially combined with Johnson who is pretty darn good against LH pitching where Fukudome seems to have more problems. The guy always hit in Japan and he seems like a smart player so I am not so sure he can't make the necessary adjustments.

So basically, this means that if Hill does good there, we get something decent, but if he sucks up the joint, we get garbage? Thats the dumbest thing Ive ever heard. How about I go out and buy a lottery ticket, and how much I pay hinges on if I win. Just keep the damn guy, and if he sucks, let him go. If Baltimore still wants him then, more power to them. So you think those 6 weeks of spring training are going to pretty much tell the tale, huh?

And I remember when Soto really sucked and most people didn't even believe he was worthy of protection on the 40 man roster. Funny thing with young players, some wind up good and some don't.

Hill was the Cubs #3 starter going into last season and Pie was the opening day CF'er. And even if Hendry had some crystal ball to see that both these guys would flame out I don't know that there is any evidence that MacPhail was willing to make the trade but Hendry didn't want to give them up.

Here we go again.... http://chicago.cubs.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20090126&content_id=3773980&vkey=news_chc&fext=.jsp&c_id=chc

But this could drag on for a while.... http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-thu-cubsjan22,0,3997737.story

They should be excited. I think Pie can develop into a good player provided he gets an extended opportunity. I am not sure that an extended opportunity against AL East pitching bodes well for Pie.

Whatever the package is, we need to include Gregg too. Addition by Subtraction, if nothing else. No way they are moving Gregg to the Padres. San Diego wouldn't want to take on the salary and Lou and Hendry seem to think he will be a valuable member of the pen replacing some of Wood's production. If anyone else is likely to be added to the above list I would think it would be Cedeno. I don't see Hill of much interest to the Padres. Maybe Olson, Vitters, Hart, Stevens, Cedeno and Wuertz?

The NHL and Blackhawks got a lot more exposure and benefit from the game at Wrigley than the Tribune or Wrigley field. Whatever the new owners get out of it is just gravy as the stadium would be sitting there empty generating no revenue if they don't play the game there. The point would be for Illinois / Northwestern / Big Ten to use it as a chance to get a lot of publicity about a game that would normally be 3rd page sports section news (even if they still aren't able to penetrate that coveted Arizona average fan demographic). To be clear... by Arizona, I mean national fan with no ties to Illinois or Northwestern. I used Arizona as a example because I live in AZ. I know what you are saying since I live in Florida and the Big Ten is not paid much attention to down here either other than by transplants. However, I can say the same amount that would watch Michigan vs Notre Dame (very few, don't care, not SEC) would watch Illinois vs Northwestern (about same few, still don't care, more non-SEC teams that are probably such just as bad but don't care enough to even find out). The few that would watch it would only do so to see what Wrigley looks like as a football field. However, it would get big buzz in the Illinois area if it was Illinois / Northwestern and sell out and get very good ratings and advertising. Maybe it would be better if a it was more marquis matchup (like one of these against Notre Dame or something) but I still think the game with Illinois / Northwestern would be the talk of the area for a week or two leading up so it would benefit everyone involved. So, bottom line, you are right that Big Ten / Midwest college football gets very little interest outside of the Midwest (including Notre Dame at this point), but based on that I don't think short of transplanting USC / Florida / Oklahoma in to play the game (which would make no sense and would be just as popular at another site) the matchup of Illinois / Northwestern would be as good as any other regional game they may put together and has the best chance of happening since both programs are motivated to juggle the schedule a bit because they need the exposure (you know ESPN and the other national programs would cover it even if not that many people actually watch the game).

The NHL and Blackhawks got a lot more exposure and benefit from the game at Wrigley than the Tribune or Wrigley field. Whatever the new owners get out of it is just gravy as the stadium would be sitting there empty generating no revenue if they don't play the game there. The point would be for Illinois / Northwestern / Big Ten to use it as a chance to get a lot of publicity about a game that would normally be 3rd page sports section news (even if they still aren't able to penetrate that coveted Arizona average fan demographic).

According to the box score, Gooden only threw 73 pitches in the 10 innings. That's probably why nobody complained. Not saying this disproves your point, just that in that specific case it's not a big deal. How in the world do you throw only 73 pitches in 10 innings? The Astros hitters would have had to have swung at the first or second pitch just about every time up. They had 9 hits, 4 K's and 2 walks, so the minimum number of pitches based on the one double play they show in the box score would be 54. I find it hard to believe that there were only 19 other pitches in 10 innings that did not result in an out or a hit. What am I missing? It just doesn't seem possible.

I know he got a cortisone shot late in the last season, but they knew he had the tear and still exercised his option? That's odd Why are you acting as if he knows any more than you do about what they did or did not know?

I am not quite sure why we shouldn't have traded Marquis. Peavy or no Peavy I prefer Marshall and Gaudin in the rotation over him. And if it turns out to be Peavy then it is a no brainer.

Between Marquis, DeRosa and this move it is all just too coincidental. Even if it doesn't happen I can't help but think that Hendry is taking a calculated risk and putting all the pieces in place so he can pull the trigger quickly once the sale is complete if he gets the necessary approvals.

If you look at his short career in the minor leagues, he definitely looks like a pretty good prospect. Very respectable WHIP, ERA, K/9, BB/K and HR. If I had the choice of Randy Wolf or Olson, I'd take Olson. Well, I hope Hendry, the Padres and you have better insight about him than I do (which is not too hard since my effort was pretty much limited to googling his stats!) because it looks like he is ours.