Illini Iceman

I wonder what Jacque is thinking when he hears Hendry talking about needing a lefty OF bat. "I guess I should have hit 20 HR last year..." I guess I will have to settle for being on the best team in baseball. You got traded to the Boston Red Sox?

It's a blog/web site started by a few of the guys from Desipio. Whats it stand for/what is the web address? Probably something ironically hip. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? Ironicy Hip = Pathetically Desperate. Kind of like thinking of your hand as a girlfriend. I actually think desipio is pretty hilarious. There has been an on again off again feud for some reason. There are a group of people from NSBB that seem to harbor resentment toward Desipio and a group from Desipio that openly mock NSBB on a regular basis. However, I would have to think that a majority of the people that go to both sites are able to appreciate each for what they are. I personally like both.

Tellander was just on the score with Mully and Handley. While on the surface what he did seems stupid I thought he defended himself fairly well but I still think he should have voted. It is up on The Scores front page now. He also rips Mike North which was great. http://www.670thescore.com/ He defended himself fairly well? If he is not going to send in his ballot anyway why is he so upset that North would say he should get his vote taken away? He won't vote for Dawson but he says he is willing to give Frank Thomas a pass? Two callers ask why he didn't write about it back then and he says he did but then gives a bunch of examples not one of which are about steroids in baseball.

NO!!! NOT JAY BLUNK!!! SAY IT ISN'T TRUE!!!! All I can say is that if Carrie Muskat leaves to be the beat writer for http://www.blackhawks.nhl.com someone is going to pay.

Anyone have any idea of the last 2b we had that performed adequately that people were happy with? Johnny Evers? Ummm.......Ryne Sandberg?

Floyd put up a .281/.370/.422 line v. RHP last year, it's not like he wasn't useful. I must have missed something last year because I really didn't notice Floyd as on of Piniella's "cherished pets". He pretty much played him exclusively against RHP. Murton was platooning at the end of the season against LHP, not serving as the backup. If anything Piniella's use of Floyd last year probably helped set the market for him as a part time / platoon player only.

:lol: If the Orioles wanted him why wouldn't they just have had the Astros include him in the Tejada deal?

From what I have read he will not be healthy until mid-season. Then I would expect him to be very rusty and most likely not of much use to the major league team this season. If he wouldn't agree to a contract with a club option for next year then he can walk after this season anyway. So from the Cubs perspective they pay him a pretty good salary for another year just to get him rehabbed so he can cash in as a free agent in '09. If he would not take the two year contract then I can see why the organization decided it was better to cut him loose now. I would be very surprised if whatever team he signs with does not either get a two year deal (or one year with a team option for '09) or pays a lower amount in a one year deal than what the Cubs could have forced him to take.

Dude, he said that it was posted at cubs.com. What more do you need to know than that? Everything over there is true - those guys know their stuff.

What makes you think Pelini would be offered the LSU job? Who do you think they would go for if not Pelini? Spurrier. http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=3135858

This is the closest I could find: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/bb/5340665.html

To make the deal better for the Cubs from a financial perspective maybe the Orioles would do Cedeno, Marquis and Ohman for Tejada. If they are "dying" to move him it allows them to do that while reducing their payroll and adding a back of the rotation starter. FWIW, Marquis would have to be an upgrade from Trachsel who they had in their rotation last year.

Screw you man. As a Blackhawks fan, this is GREAT news. \:D/ seconded, looks like they're finally ready to start getting their fans back. i'm incredibly excited for the hawks, he's a perfect fit. he saw the handwriting on the wall about oh, say, before he even took the position with the cubs. If the Blackhawks want to get their fans back they should try actually making the playoffs one of these years. Winning will do the trick much more so than having some American Girl and Precious Moments giveaways. My concern with McDonough as President is that all he knew about was how to hype the games and not how to win games. He was never going to challenge Hendry and his baseball operations group about how to build a team because he didn't have the baseball experience and credibility to do so.

As a human being, yes. However, I don't admire Cobb as a person but as a baseball player, so that question is irrelevant. Do you actually think anyone believes this? Seriously, you have bent over backwards here to defend this guy when his actions were totally despicable. You are being completely dishonest here. I think anyone who has actually read his posts and not the IMB translation of his posts, would believe him. All he has said is that he was a horrible person that has had some things about him exaggerated. I didn't spin anything he said, go ahead and try and prove otherwise. For god's sake, he said that he didn't know what was worse, beating an innocent man who was just doing his job and then stabbing the person that tried to break the fight up or punching someone. If your head isn't spinning then you're just as crazy as he is. Does that count? Nope, sorry buddy. Saying that someone was a racist, but not a "terrible racist" and offering up his batting average as a defense is perhaps the worst thing I've read on this board. I tend to agree with your position regarding Cobb, but the name calling and sarcastic comments don't reflect well on you. Believe it or not, two people can look at the same facts and sometimes have different opinions. There is no reason you can't have a respectful discussion about it.

So you'd prefer disgruntled Jacque at 5M on the bench rather than Infante at 2M on the bench? Why? Because disgruntled Jones at least provides a little bit of offense to a team that is in DIRE need of offense. And I really don't care about whether someone is disgruntled or not. It's not like Jones can just go out there and try to suck, because his next contract with a big league team will be dependent on how he performs in his contract year. Is that little bit of offense really worth an extra three million that could be spent elsewhere though? Also, although in a somewhat limited sample size, Jacque has sucked coming off the bench in his career. When Hendry acquired Jones as a FA he was mocked for doing so. Jones has been panned on a pretty regular basis for the last two seasons (other than the occassional "he hasn't been as bad as I thought" backhanded compliment). Now Hendry finds a way to get rid of him and save salary. In doing so he publicly states that this will open up the opportunity to give Pie a shot at the full time job, which many people around here have been clamoring for and lamenting the fact that the Cubs don't give the young players a chance to prove themselves. And still somehow it spins around to Hendry screwing up. Interesting.

Yes he was. Unless by "he" you mean Marshall. Marquis was on the playoff roster and Marshall wasn't. Not that I see why it makes a difference either way in regards to decisions for the '08 team.

Baldelli isn't anywhere close to a stud producer. If his one half season of good production was maintained over a full season, maybe we could talk. But there isn't a whole lot of support for the theory that this would be likely. Sure there is. Baldelli is a real solid player when healthy. His injuries have not been anything major like knee surgery. It has mostly been a nagging hamstring issue and it seems to me that by giving it a whole offseason that should be able to heal. I don't think that the D-Rays will give him away, but it doesn't really seem that he is much in their plans with all the other outfielders they have. I would think a package of Marshall and perhaps Wuertz might be enough. Both are cheap but have major league experience so it wouldn't seem like a salary dump. The Rays could put Marshall right into the rotation and use Wuertz as an eighth inning set up man. They need pitching badly.

http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/7405426?MSNHPHMA And also that by "majors", he did not mean the Pittsburgh Pirates.

At least they can still get the Led out. And have "2 fer" Tuesdays

And FWIW they would not have even made the playoffs if Trevor Hoffman had just been able to convert 1 of his final 2 save opportunities. The Rockies beat two other teams in the Phillies and D-Backs that also did not have many players on their roster who were "bursting at the seams with experience". I think I agree with your point, but I am not sure the Rockies help too much in proving it.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=3062658

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=3062658

http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/7323872?MSNHPHMA

I doubt you get toasted for that. Theriot's really not good, despite whatever "grit" he may possess. If the Cubs can't land a big-time SS, I'll hope for Cedeno to figure things out and supplant Theriot. I hope Cedeno can figure out things too, but so far he has looked like the epitome of a AAAA hitter. In which 1/16 of the season are you talking about? I really am sick of this crap. Most every player has an adjustment period when moving up but somehow the Cubs and their fans expect the player to put up exactly the same numbers they have in the minors right away. It doesn't happen very often. Yeah, it would be different if the Cubs had given Cedeno over 500 AB's in a season and he still had wound up with a BA of .245, OBP of .271 and SLG of .339. Oh, wait a second... Sorry, but the idea of not upgrading SS so they can potentially waste another year like they did in 2006 hoping that Cedeno figures it out at the big league level doesn't seem all that great to me. Because we all know that at age 23 he will likely never get better. But anyway, who said that they weren't for upgrading? It never ends with some Cub fans does it? Really, really, myopic. Don't be so hard on yourself.

I doubt you get toasted for that. Theriot's really not good, despite whatever "grit" he may possess. If the Cubs can't land a big-time SS, I'll hope for Cedeno to figure things out and supplant Theriot. I hope Cedeno can figure out things too, but so far he has looked like the epitome of a AAAA hitter. In which 1/16 of the season are you talking about? I really am sick of this crap. Most every player has an adjustment period when moving up but somehow the Cubs and their fans expect the player to put up exactly the same numbers they have in the minors right away. It doesn't happen very often. Yeah, it would be different if the Cubs had given Cedeno over 500 AB's in a season and he still had wound up with a BA of .245, OBP of .271 and SLG of .339. Oh, wait a second... Sorry, but the idea of not upgrading SS so they can potentially waste another year like they did in 2006 hoping that Cedeno figures it out at the big league level doesn't seem all that great to me.